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#anyways ive been out of the loop in the actual community for a long time idek how im gonna integrate back
pantherloid · 2 years
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Thanks for being here :)
Even tho I kinda FELL OFF in the last two years.
Feeling weirdly sentimental that this blog’s now half a decade old hooray. This was my first art blog that I started when I was in my mid teens. I shoulda fucking waited longer to improve before posting art bc my art was BAD and my characters looked weird but some of you were still very encouraging anyway. <33
I appreciate everyone being here and I especially appreciate those of you who’ve been here since the earlier years (no clue if any of those people are still here or not and im talking to the air) I hope you like my content shift and will forgive me for being extremely cringe in the past – not in the harmless way, I mean in the psychic damage way.
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losersroom · 4 months
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twenty questions for fic writers
tagged by @tetrapod7! thanks man, this was a fun one.
1. how many works do you have on ao3? 17 on my current account. there's more on my old one and obviously that doesn't count everything i published on other platforms (livejournal, ff.net) in the ancient days, lol
2. what's your total ao3 wordcount? again just on the wolfspider account, 168,153. i cant tell if that feels low or high to me
3. what fandoms do you write for? right now, just wild hrpf. in the past it's been mostly anime and various cartoons.
4. top five fics by kudos: i'm hitting the skip button on this because like. wrt my own work i think it's not a very good metric of EITHER how popular those stories actually were OR the quality of them; they're mostly the TUA ones and im chalking that up to that fandom being Huge when i was active. my most kudos'd fic of all time is still how much was mine to keep, though, and i think that one holds up.
5. do you respond to comments? i try to now. i went through a long phase of not engaging with comments due to Social Anxiety and also being kind of fed up with the hyper-combative culture in the fandoms i was in. like i wanted to just yeet my work out there and be done with it. in hrpf fandom i'm actually interested in the community aspect though so ive been trying to get over myself and respond as best i can.
6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? the brodsfabes time loop fic, hands down. it's weird because as a reader i am um. not very into unhappy endings or unconsummated angst but every once in a while when i'm writing i'll get into a Mood and write something viscerally upsetting. anyway that one was pretty clearly me processing some grief that was happening in my real life, lol.
7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? probably entangled, from my spiderverse days. ngl i kind of hate it now though so let's move on from this. i think most of my fic has happy or at least ambiguously-positive endings, though.
8. do you get hate on fics? only one time ever and it was someone complaining that a ship i tagged for wasn't present in the story after One Chapter so. we're discounting that one. i've been pretty lucky!
9. do you write smut? yeah. my relationship with writing pornography ebbs and flows, like. sometimes i'll be really into it but sometimes i'll just stick a sex scene into a story where i feel like it's the least interesting thing that happens because people expect it and aren't going to read a romance that isn't leading up to that. i'm a horrible pervert and building up to a sex scene is an easy way to give your story a climax (...in multiple senses of the word) though so. why not.
10. craziest crossover: i don't write crossovers but if i did it would be the insane one ive been thinking about lately where the minnesota wild are stuck in the dungeon from dungeon meshi
11. have you ever had a fic stolen? not to a degree that i can prove it but part of the reason i left TUA fandom was somebody, in my opinion, ripped off large chunks of one of my fics and did just enough massaging of the language to make it defensible as Not Plagiarism. ruined the whole experience for me though.
12. have you ever had a fic translated? no, i think that would be one of the highest honors i could receive as a writer though. i wish i knew enough of a second language to translate my own work, but i'm still at like a kindergarten level in japanese so that will. Not happen.
13. have you ever co-written a fic before? tried to once with someone i am no longer friends with, it was a disaster. never gonna do that again. i am just too much of a control freak to relinquish any amount of creative decisionmaking i think.
14. all time favorite ship? don't have one! i tend to like hyperfixate on one ship for anywhere from one month to a year and a half and then when the brain juice runs out im Done and i never want to think about this concept again. im giving check please jackparse a point for being a ship i can read about post-fixation without getting bored but other than that. right now it's 725, in the future, who can say.
15. what's a wip you want to finish but never will? [stares at my overflowing gdocs draft folder. stares at the camera] i do not see it
16. what are your writing strengths? i like my prose, most of the time, and i think i'm pretty good at descriptive writing and like, internal character voice. sometimes i can accidentally stumble into excellent pacing
17. what are your writing weaknesses? INTENTIONALLY good pacing. writing dialogue that sounds like a human said it and not a sitcom character. i'm decent at line-by-line editing but awful at structural editing. recently ive become aware that i tend to subconsciously reuse certain plot beats a lot.
18. thoughts on dialogue in another language? like anything else, there's a way to do this that's fine and interesting and a way to do it that's insultingly terrible and it all depends on intent and execution. like if you're peppering in phrases in a second language just to show off that a character Is Foreign, don't do that. try to do it in a way that's realistic for how people talk. do it purposefully, i suppose
19. first fandom you wrote in? god dude i do NOT remember this was literally 21 years ago but probably either naruto or fullmetal alchemist.
20. favorite fic you've written? probably one of the unpublishable ones tbh. or the time loop one again. honestly i really like all my hrpf work, ive been putting out some bangers lately. it's nice to feel like ive been growing as an ~artist~ or whatever.
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udon-udon · 3 years
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So for the past few years I’m not really in any community or anything so I’m just really out of the loop and kinda just floating around which can feel a lil lonely cause it feels like I don’t belong anywhere or anything, and if feels really empty cause I’m not passionate about anything with people I know. I’ve made quite a bit more artists friends the past few years as well but it never went anywhere beyond that first few interactions in the group chat/I only interacted in a group chat (that are now all dead) I feel like I’m not acknowledged by other artists around me and/or I’m not good enough. I don’t draw a lot of fan art either so that plays a huge factor in getting noticed or joining a community :/ i also feel like because of this, ive been becoming/feeling more distant with existing art friends and haha seeing them become better friends with others makes me think that I’m getting abandoned :’) or this irrational fear that they hate me because of something i said or did that i didn’t know hurt them or something. I feel like I’ve also closed myself off more and more because of this, u know where you distant yourself so you don’t get hurt when they do leave thanks abandonment issues and then in the end I end up all alone, which I’ve come to brainwash myself saying “I’ll be fine alone, I’ll get used to it” but even if I do, I can’t help but feel envious when I see artists friends on Twitter tagging each other in art memes, replying to their art posts, etc etc. I get over it in the end cause I know that in the end it’s really all my fault for not trying to become close to other artists. You can argue and say “but udon, just get into a fandom then and start there” but I just can’t, It’s hard for me to get obsessed over things/get into things compared to when I was younger. Nothing strikes an interest in me anymore and even if it does, it’s not too deep or deep enough where I’d want to draw fan art (no:ze being an exception cause I’ve been really obsessed with her lately, but she’s not art/anime related). I started playing genshin but I already grew bored of it kinda after a week. I mean I’d still go on and do commissions even though I’m barely into the Liyue story line so I actually have a ton of content, but I’m simply not…. too interested. Also school needs me to worry about assignments so I gotta prioritize (which I still fail at) but god that goes to show how short my attention span is for liking things nowadays it’s kinda sad. Speaking of school, there’s just so many things to think about on top of these sadass feelings, it’s a lot. It leaves me no time to draw much lately, and I only manage to draw if I decide to prioritize art over school work, which makes me more stressed in the end cause I’ll have no time to work on them. I think I was able to distract myself from these feelings during the summer cause I kept myself preoccupied with making my VN, so I focused all my energy there cause I love making my VNs, forgetting all about my Sadness and Not Belonging-ness, but now that I’m done making it, I have more time to not be happy/not be able to do things I like. Also all this is probably my pre-period PMS talking as we all know, but I can’t deny that Ive still been feeling like this for the past few years. All I ever wanted was a close knit art friend group that I’m able to have fun with and chill with, and be acknowledged, and loved and wanted. I’ve had a few groups before, but they always end up becoming a ghost town or two of them getting into a fight and end up splitting up. Anyway, that is all I wanted to dump here to get it out. I know it’s still a problem that ultimately it’s up to me to fix for myself but idk when I’ll be able to fix it. Can’t it just miraculously happen one day pls. Notice me senpais (even on a serious post I still end up joking at the end to brush it off and not make things too depressed sounding which undoubtedly that is what I am. Which I’ve come to terms with and accepted that even though there are people out there doing a lot more worse than I am, my own depression isn’t something I should invalidate. But it’s still a work in progress. I need to start looking for a therapist highkey.
TLDR:
- udon feels like she doesn’t belong anywhere in the art community -she can’t get interested in things like fandoms anymore -shes distancing herself with her existing art friends cause she feels like they’re leaving her and basically just wants something she doesn’t have aka a tight knit artist friend group that won’t become a ghost town. -udon just wants to be noticed by other artists. -Udon can’t make long term close art friends. -Udon acknowledges her depression
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john-cardoza · 4 years
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tell me.... about the zoey/autumn fake dating au 👀
oh i have been waiting for this ask,,,, okay so,, a few months ago i made this post and ever since then I have not been able to stop thinking about the concept.
so. its 1x02. zoey has just found out max is in love with her. she goes to the coffee shop with mo and sees i wanna dance with somebody.
except this time instead of going “i should set her up with max despite the fact that thats a dead end relationship since he’s currently in love with me” SHE INSTEAD goes “huh, autumn is lonely,, i need to get max to leave me alone,,, what if i just dated fake dated autumn”
bi!zoey rights
in her head this is obviously the perfect solution, because she likes autumn and this way they can hang out together and be best friends bc she wants to be autumns friend
this is incorrect. she actually has a crush on autumn but emotional intelligence? don’t know her.
the next time max asks her about hand picked zoey is like “sorry i’m going on a date that night! maybe you can take leif”
max: i don’t believe you. this is about the whole boss thing again isn’t it?
zoey: NO absolutely not! i’m going out with autumn, she’s actually picking me up from work.
this is obviously calculated, zoey asked autumn to come pick her up bc she knew max would want proof. but they do actually have date plans, they’re going to the planetarium bc zoey’s a nerd
anyway this continues for a while with zoey and autumn going on a bunch of dates and just hanging out all the time, zoey tells autumn about her powers and of course autumn thinks its super neat and loves how the universe gave zoey the tools to help people.
sidenote: i think at some point they do have a fight/discussion about what zoey’s powers mean for their friendship. autumn decides that as long as zoey makes an effort to communicate and keeps her in the loop, she’s cool with it.
the whole time they’re drifting further and further from being just friends, bed sharing, almost kisses, you name it. 
the cutesy scenes of zoey and autumn bonding are of course interspersed with mo telling zoey that she’s an idiot <3
i haven’t decided if zoey knew she was bi before this or if thats going to be one of the things she figures out along the way.
the climax of this story comes when zoey tells max about her powers and that she knew he was in love with her and did nothing and then he realizes that she started dating autumn around that time and he’s like “so you're just dating autumn as a way to– avoid me? thats low zoey"
and zoey is like "no i was helping autumn, that was just,,,, a bonus?"
anyway they fight and it causes zoey to have like,, a realization,, because she’s like,, no, i don’t want it to be fake? i love her? i love her!!
zoey: sorry max i cant continue this conversation i need to go confess my love for autumn <3
max: uh okay?
anyway she runs to find autumn and its all very dramatic,, maybe its even raining so zoey shows up at autumns door soaking wet in the most cliche way possible 
zoey tells autumn that she loves her and autumn is like “ive been waiting for you to admit that” and then they kiss and finally get to go on a real date
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shhhhyoursister · 4 years
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okay im gonna post this right before i go to bed because i havent posted new stuff in a while and its like AHH but okay so here is the first of the unfinshied/unedited things ive written, and the first of the two lets say..... niche aus i have.....very niche and very exposing of how much of a loser i am!! 
i mentioned this one a few times and before everything got bad in the world i had so many ideas but here yall go here is my beloved davenzi pokemon au i hope all you other losers enjoy
(also please excuse all the brackets i write things out of order but always need to make notes of what happens in between)
Matteo pushed the door open, still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, and let out a loud yawn as he stretched an arm over his head. He raised the glass of Pinap juice to his mouth and took a sip, smiling around the rim as he looked out at the large meadow behind his house.
The berry trees were growing tall around the perimeter of the fence, patches of grass at various lengths sprouting out of the ground. The large pond off to the side had its own waterfall, a feature his mother was extremely proud of, and he could admit that it added a little something special to the space
It wasn’t much, but they  did what they could with what they had. It was enough for the Pokémon they cared for, at least. 
At that thought, he felt something tugging at his pants, and he glanced down and smiled at the Vulpix at his feet. Its teeth were caught in the fabric but he reached down to pat it on the head anyway, knowing that was just its way of greeting him. It let go and stood next to him, like it was expecting something.
“What do you want?” he asked, poking it lightly in the side with his foot, and laughed when it rolled onto its back and latched onto it with its paw, and tried to secure its hold with the leg that was missing one. Matteo got it off easy and it sprung back up, ready to play.
He rolled his eyes, and walked further out into the meadow, the Vulpix trotting along happily beside him. There were a few Pokémon that he needed to check on before breakfast for himself or the rest of the Pokémon roaming around the property, and he wanted to get it done fast because the Tauros with the bandage over its eye was snorting at him from over in its usual corner. He quickened his pace.
He was looking for the Luvdisc that his mother had found a few days before, alone and hungry in shallow water, and his eyes scanned over the mostly clear water, trying to catch any sign of the pink water-type swimming around. He saw it just as it darted around a Buizel and behind a rock, seeming to be in much better shape than the day before. He was about to turn and head to the small shed in the back where they kept some of the Pokémon in more serious condition, but he looked up when he heard the door slide open, and his mom call his name.
“Matteo, Jonas is here to say bye!” She yelled out, and he turned and started making his way back.
“I didn’t get to look at the Pachirisu yet.” He said, jogging up to her. She was smiling softly at him, her long brown hair pulled back in a bandana. She was holding a bowl in her arms, no doubt the breakfast she had been making for the Pokémon when he had come downstairs that morning
“Don’t worry about that, go see your friend, and wish him luck!” she said, walking out the back door, “He’s going to battle his next gym leader!” 
“Yeah, yeah,” Matteo muttered as he walked past her, setting his glass down as he went. 
He found Jonas by the front door, six Pokéballs attached to his waist, and a large bag on his back. He had his Jigglypuff out of its ball by his side, and it started bouncing when Matteo got closer.
“Hey, Luigi!” Jonas exclaimed, pulling him in for a hug, and Matteo squeezed his arms around his backpack. The hug was bittersweet, and he almost didn’t want to let go. He didn’t have many friends in his little town, and his responsibilities at the Pokémon Sanctuary made it difficult to go too far.
“You feeling ready?” Matteo asked, knowing what Jonas was going to say. He had always been confident, and was getting through the gyms at a rapid pace.
“Of course, bro,” he said, grinning and punching Matteo in the arm, “I feel ready to battle anyone after beating that ghost-type gym leader. That was rough, it took me four fucking tries!”
Matteo nodded as Jonas went off. Matteo had heard the stories many times, not just from Jonas, but similar ones from other trainers in his town; the gym leader that happened to be the closest to them also happened to be one of the toughest. His Pokémon were strong, he was strong, but most importantly his connection to each of them was strong. He was admired, envied, and heavily respected.
Nobody knew anything about him, though.
The gym was off deep in the woods, off of one of the random routes running through their town. It was not only hard to find, but hard to navigate, as once one entered it was quite clear that the house was designed to keep people out. There were traps and dead ends and looping hallways that all just led back to the beginning, and Jonas said it took him hours to even find the staircase that led to the gym leader.
“I should be heading off if I want to get to the city before it’s dark,” Jonas said, and extended his arms for another hug. Matteo squeezed him again, and said his own goodbye before Jonas ruffled his hair and went out the door, the Jigglypuff following close behind. Matteo let out a sigh, and walked back through his house. 
“Matteo, can you come here a second?” he heard his mother call from the kitchen, and he sighed again and poked his head into the room.
“Yeah, mama?” He asked, itching to get back outside. He had been making progress with the skittish Ponyta that hid whenever anyone else came near it, and he had been wanting to see if it would eat out of his hand that morning.
“You seem sad,” she said, and he stopped himself from rolling his eyes and walked further into the kitchen as she continued, “you’re not usually sad when Jonas or your other friends go off to battle.”
“Yeah, well, I’m going to miss him,” he said, knowing that wasn’t all, “last time he left he didn’t come back for a month. And I haven’t seen Abdi or Carlos in longer than that, and I don’t even know where Amira is right now.”
His mother nodded. She had heard him say that before, note that as the reason he was upset anytime the idea of gyms or badges or battling was brought up. She walked over to him and put a hand on his cheek, and smiled gently.
“You know, if you want to take a break from this and train,  you can.”
Matteo closed his eyes. It was something she had offered before, and he knew that there was almost no way he would be willing to take her up on it. The sanctuary was too important to him, no matter how much he might’ve wanted a party of his own. He didn’t need his own Pokémon when there were dozens that needed him right at home.
“I’m not going to stop helping you here, mama,” Matteo responded as usual, “this is more important than winning a few gym badges.”
“You wouldn’t even have to stop if you don’t want to,” she said, patting him on the cheek and moving back over to the stove where she was cooking their breakfast, “if you want to do both, find some Pokémon from the sanctuary. I’m sure some of them would be more than happy to battle with you.”
Matteo laughed sarcastically, and then actually thought about what his mother said, and his mouth drew into a line. He didn’t know if he wanted to put that burden on any of the Pokémon that they were caring for, even though he knew in the back of his head that some would be willing and able. He thought about that little Vulpix that would follow behind him and nip at his heels, and the Butterfree that would always swoop over his head and chirp happily at him, and even the Tauros with the eyepatch liked him as long as he was fed.
“I don’t know,” he settled on, and then turned to the door, “I’m going to check on the rest.”
****
Later that night, Matteo was sitting out on the roof outside of his room, after climbing through the window. It looked out over the entire sanctuary, but it was too dark for him to see much. He could see some small ripples in the water in the pond, but beyond that the only thing he could make out were sounds. He could hear something, probably a Rattata or Sandshrew, scratching and digging around the grass, and the melodic chirps of a Kricketot. He heard the same Noctowl as before cooing quietly in one of the trees, and he closed his eyes as a breeze blew by.
They were the sounds he had grown up with. Matteo was raised out in the sanctuary more than he was inside his own home. His mother and father had opened it soon after getting married, had built it into something highly respected in their community. They had a large staff working with them and they would get multiple calls each day from people finding injured Pokémon out in the wild.
There were photo albums full of him as an infant being stared at by a confused Pikachu, being (very carefully) held by a Kangaskhan, laughing as a Ledyba flew overhead. Once he was old enough he started working alongside his parents, and everyone in town loved the Florenzi’s, the couple that would save wild Pokémon with their wild son by their side. 
When Matteo was around twelve, things went a little sour. His dad started talking more about battling, and gyms, and how cool it would be to go out and see the world beyond their small town. He tried to convince Matteo that they could go off and battle together, father and son, and when Matteo refused, his father had gone quiet. A few days later, he came down for breakfast to his mother crying, his father’s stuff gone, and six of the Pokémon from the sanctuary missing as well.
He took a deep pull from the joint in his mouth, remembering the fierce promise he had made to himself that morning; he would never, ever, leave his mother like his father did. Battling and gym badges weren’t worth it.
But there was something in the back of Matteo’s head that was starting to get louder as he sat there. Something saying that just going to one gym wouldn’t be the same; he could work at the sanctuary during the day, train with (willing) Pokémon at night, and in a few weeks make the short trip to the ghost-type gym. He wasn’t expecting that he’d win, no matter what gym he went to, but the desire for something more was unfortunately undeniable. Matteo hated what his father did, but could understand the urge to run away. 
He stubbed the joint out and took one more look at the sanctuary before going back inside and getting ready for bed. As he climbed under the covers, he realized he made up his mind. His first task for the morning, alongside his usual morning chores, was to see which Pokémon wanted to, and were able to, battle. 
****
[Matteo makes a party and its kind of a mishmash of misfits but it’s the best he can do because he doesn't want to go out and catch wild Pokémon especially when he has some that want to battle with him]
[He spends a few weeks training and it's really tough and they aren’t amazing but they're better than he expected, and he doesn't really get why they love him and listen to him the way they do]
[One day he decided that he's ready and he promises his mom that he's gonna be back that night and he goes off to find the ghost type gym]
[He finds the gym and it looks completely abandoned and he has to climb over a gate to get in but he does it and then he has to walk through this super creepy dark place and he's having a rough time and he's getting more and more scared and worried that he's in the wrong place and that what he's doing is a bad idea and that he should just turn around when-]
And then finally, a staircase.
Matteo saw it at the end of the hall and sighed in relief. He was exhausted, glad that his Pokémon were in their Pokéballs so they weren’t as tired as him. He wiped the sweat off of his brow, and then tied his bandana around his head to keep his hair out of his face as he walked towards the stairs. He placed his foot on the first one and winced at the loud creak that came from it. He walked up the stairs carefully, seeing a door as he got closer to the top.
He finally reached the top of the stairway, and his shoulders dropped when he saw the door. There was a board across it, blocking it off, and Matteo felt anger start to bubble up inside him. He had spent hours trying to find the fucking place, had banked on Jonas mentioning a staircase, and had gotten so hopeful when he saw it. He huffed and, like a child, kicked hard at the door. His jaw dropped when it swung open.
He carefully made his way inside, his eyes scanning around the large room, too dark for him to make anything out. There seemed to be a fog making it even harder to see, and he waved his arm in front of him to see if he could clear it away. He took a few steps, and then a few more, and was about to take another when he heard a quiet, “I’d stop there if I were you.”
Matteo’s head snapped up and he froze, unable to tell where the sudden voice came from. He could feel his breathing pick up, and he could even hear it in the silence that followed the voice, and was about to turn and bolt when he heard, also quiet but with a bit of a laugh under it, “I didn’t mean to scare you, I just didn’t want you to fall in.”
Matteo whipped his head around, trying to figure out what he was about to fall in, when it seemed like the fog seemed to thin. He looked around the room as details became clearer, the blueish-green tiles on the walls and the white, chipped paint, and he looked down at his feet and stumbled back a few steps; he was standing right at the edge of what seemed to be a huge, empty, swimming pool.
Well, almost empty. As the fog cleared, Matteo could make out a figure on the other side, who seemed to be sitting on the edge, their feet dangling into the empty space below. He watched the figure kick off the edge and land with a quiet sound a few feet below in the pool itself, and then they started coming closer.
Matteo felt himself get nervous. Not scared, like he had been initially getting to the building, and wandering around in the dark, and when he had first come into the room and seen the fog. He was nervous, because there was no way that this person wasn’t the gym leader, which meant that he was about to battle a gym leader. 
“Are you going to come down here?” The voice asked again, definitely coming from the approaching gym leader. 
Matteo took a breath before looking around and spotting a ladder that led down into the pool. He made his way over on shaky legs and got himself down as carefully as he could, landing hard on his feet and stumbling a little. He righted himself just as he heard the gym leader stop, and he took another deep breath before looking up.
And he huffed out that breath, because the man standing in front of him had to be a dream, or maybe there was a Pokémon there that had some kind of power that was making him hallucinate, because there was no other explanation for how he was so beautiful. And Matteo knew that he shouldn’t have been focusing on that, but he was only human, and he was very, very gay.
“You’re quiet,” the gym leader said, crossing his arms over his chest and smiling, “you are here to battle, right?”
“Yes, I am,” Matteo said quickly, grabbing a hand around one of the Pokéballs around his waist, “my first one.”
He wanted to slap a hand over his face for saying that. He didn’t think that was good information to tell the person that he was about to battle if he wanted to seem confident, not that that wasn’t already out the window with his obvious panic. He watched the gym leader smile bright, and he wished it didn’t make his stomach jolt the way it did.
“Aw, you chose me to be your first?” he asked, placing a hand over his heart, “I’m honored.”
Matteo smiled. He was funny at least, even if he was going to beat Matteo and his Pokémon within six rounds probably. 
“Mostly just out of convenience, this is the gym closest to me.” he explained, not really knowing how much he was supposed to be talking. He had no idea what he was doing, at all, but the gym leader didn’t seem to be rushing anything along.
“That makes sense, I’m not usually the first gym people come to. I don’t know why that is, though,” he stepped back and threw his arms out, “I try to make it nice, you know?”
Matteo snorted, “Yeah, that fence you have to hop to get in is really welcoming, and the board across the door really makes me feel at home.”
The gym leader laughed, and Matteo let himself laugh with him, losing a bit of the nerves he had coming in.
“Well, I’m glad you like it,” he said, and then grabbed a Pokéball seemingly out of thin air, threw it up and then as he caught it turned to Matteo and asked, “so, are you ready for your first battle? I’ll go easy on you.”
He said it was a slightly patronizing grin, so Matteo grabbed his own Pokéball in his hand, tilted his head with a sweet smile and said, “Don’t worry, you don’t have to.”
David looked happily surprised and nodded, and before Matteo could react he threw the Pokéball into the air, and a Mimikyu landed on the ground in front of him. Matteo looked at it in shock.
“You have a Mimikyu?” he asked, wanting to get closer to look. The Pokémon was looking at him, or at least the disguise part was, gently flopping around on top of the Pokémon it was concealing inside.
“Yeah, it was one of my first,” the gym leader said with a small smile, and then shook himself out of it and grinned cocikly, “which means it’s one of my strongest.”
Matteo nodded, and threw his own Pokéball into the air, Vulpix springing onto the ground in front of him. It looked ready, stanced and nose pointed at the Mimikyu in front of it. The battle started when the gym leader called out his first move.
And Matteo lost. Badly, and quickly, and if he wasn’t so worried about getting home so he could tend to his Pokémon he would've been more embarrassed. He dropped to his knees next to his Sandshrew as it trembled on the ground from the last attack laid on it by the gym leader’s second Pokémon.
“That was pretty good for a first try,” he heard echo through the room, and he looked up and pushed his sweaty hair out of his eyes.
“It wasn’t good. I wasn’t meant to be a trainer, and these Pokémon weren’t meant to battle. I should just give up.” He sighed, and held the Pokéball out so the Sandshrew could return to it and rest. He got up and dusted himself off, and saw the gym leader standing much closer than he had been.
“It’s not that you weren’t good, you just weren’t ready. You have a connection to these guys. I can see it.” the gym leader said earnestly, reaching his hand out. 
“That doesn’t mean they should be battling,” he sighed, “they’re all from the sanctuary me and my mom have. I shouldn’t have made them do this.”
“You weren’t making them do anything,” the gym leader said quickly, “seriously, you can tell they’re enjoying it because they’re doing it with you. I’ve been a gym leader for a while, you should trust me on this. I know Pokémon.”
“Well, so do I,” Matteo said with an angry huff, making his mind up again, “and I’m done battling.”
He turned, ignoring the disappointed look on the face of the gym leader, and climbed up the ladder before hurrying home.
****
[Matteo really doesnt think hes gonna go back but the pokemon were having fun and he kinda wants to see david again so he starts training again, gets a bit stronger and goes back]
He found it easier the second time, and made his way through it easier the second time too, as if he actually remembered the way through the crazy maze inside. When he got to the top of the stairs and saw the boarded up door again he snorted, and took a deep breath before pushing his way into the room again.
He was greeted by the same thick fog, the same tiles around the walls, the same chipping paint, but he knew to not take too many steps in. He figured the gym leader knew he came in, as the fog started clearing again once he was in the room, and he saw the same figure seated in the same spot on the edge of the pool.
“Oh, the boy from the Pokémon sanctuary!” the gym leader called out as he jumped down onto the pool tiles, “I’ve been expecting you.”
Matteo laughed and said, “I didn’t think I was coming back, how could you have been expecting me?”
“I could see it in your eyes,” the gym leader took a few steps closer, “you want to win. Or you want to prove something. No matter what it is, you have a reason to be here.”
Matteo smiled before making his way down the ladder and into the pool. His feet hit the tiles and he turned around so he could the gym leader, who he was getting very tired of only referring to as ‘the gym leader’.
“What’s your name?” he asked quickly, before he could think better of it, “Like, I know your whole thing is being mysterious but I have a feeling I’m going to be coming back here again.”
“Oh, so we’re already on a first name basis?” the gym leader asked, spinning around and a few steps towards the wall he had been sitting on, and he leaned his back against it, smiling.
“I just figured it’ll save us time later. Easier to do it now than in a month when it’ll be awkward.” He shrugged, offering a half smile. He tried to play it off as a joke, but he wanted to know.
He watched the gym leader smile, and then bite his lip and look down at the floor. He tapped his foot on the ground a few times before kicking off the wall and saying, “Okay, then. I’m David.”
Matteo smiled, nodded, quietly responded, “I’m Matteo,” and took a Pokéball off of his belt. 
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yoongi-sugaglider · 4 years
Text
Daegu Quarantine
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Jungkook x reader
Gang/ zombie apocalypse au
Warnings:
Gore, violence, zombies, mention of drugs and drug dealing, weapons discharge in self defense, main character death, zombies, course language, zombies, drinking, did I mention zombies?
Summary:
They were the top of their game, known throughout the city as the smartest and most dangerous crew to ever hit the Daegu streets. But what’s going to happen when this group of young men encounter something right out of a horror film?
Word count: 2394
Part 10===Part 11===Part 12
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“Alright Tae Bae, let’s see what’s going on with your system.”
In the time it had taken us to clean up after dinner, Taehyung had already set up everything he needed in order to communicate through remote video feed with his mentor.
I’d decided to join Taehyung and Jeanette in the security area of our basement living room, sliding in beside Jeanette on the overly large sofa and snuggling up beneath her blanket with a smile sent her way before focusing in on the conversation unfolding before us.
Tae was posted up on the floor, feet crossed in his lap and a large keyboard situated on top of his knees as his eyes roamed the information displayed on the massive tv hung on the wall. The screen itself flashed a myriad of information, lines of code and text along with a small set of squares at the bottom left corner that gave us a live view of the surrounding grounds and security checkpoints.
In the top left was a video feed of Black Rose, a sweet looking woman roughly my age whose smile lit up her whole face every time her eyes glanced back to what I assumed was Taehyung’s face displayed on her own screen. I couldn’t help but feel there was something more than the connection of mentor and apprentice between the two.
“I managed to trace the outside signal as far as the local area before I got cut off from it. Whatever it was that let them in was enough for them to feed my cameras a signal to loop come a certain time of day. That’s when the attack happened.” Taehyung frowned, glancing at the video image of the ashen haired woman and blushing brightly as he averted his gaze elsewhere.
“Sounds to me like they’ve been in your system before. Or are at least familiar with the type of code you were writing for it…”
I couldn’t help but glance over at Jeanette who seemed just as bewildered as I felt with all the technical jargon being thrown back and forth between them.
“Any idea what they’re saying?” I asked in an overly dramatic stage whisper.
Jeanette shook her head, blowing a bit of curly hair out of her eyes with a huff. “None in the slightest honestly. I’ve heard Jangmi talk like this before but it always goes way over my head.”
Tae snorted, his eyes darting to the two of us for a moment before focusing back in on his job. “Since I’ve got you here, could you run a backdoor screen for me? At least then I’ll know what I’m missing before we go whole hog on the fuckers.”
Black Rose shook her head, sighing lazily before typing quickly on her end. The sound of high speed clicking filled the speakers along with the sound of Taehyung’s own. The screen glowed a dark green color as line after line of letters and numbers and symbols flashed across it. Everything moved so fast that for a moment I grew dizzy just trying to keep up with it all.
Jungkook at that point wandered into the room, coming around the sofa to sit on its arm beside me and throw an extra long arm around my shoulders.
“Anything?” He asked, knowing that his words would interrupt Taehyung’s focus, he’d spoken in a low whisper just as Jeanette and I had.
“No clue to be honest, but damn if I wouldn’t be able to tell you anyway.” I glanced up at Kookie, blushing as he threw me a charming smile that, no matter how many times I’d seen it, still managed to make my insides flutter.
“Well let me see…” He looked over to the tv, eyes darting back and forth as he watched the words fly by.
“Every computer system, no matter how complicated, has a back door. They’re usually protected by something called a firewall, basically a shield the system has in place so your information can’t get stolen or your software can’t get hacked.” Jungkook’s fingers trailed along my shoulder, leaving trails of heat in their wake as he continued to watch the two computer geniuses work.
“What’s basically happening is Jangmi is attacking Tae’s firewall, trying to find any weaknesses in it to see how exactly the hackers got into our system.”
“HA!” A triumphant shout echoed through the speakers, jolting Taehyung out of his hyper focused stupor and causing him to stare at the screen in shock.
“Are you serious? That one line of god damn…”
“And here I thought I taught you well, little grasshopper. Such a shame that a tiny bit of code like that could cause such a massive amount of damage…” Black Rose hummed.
I couldn’t help but to watch in fascination as Taehyung basically melted down in front of us, rolling on the floor after discarding his keyboard and gripping his hair. He wailed like a little child, cursing and fussing and drawing full on belly laughs out of each of us as we watched him go on.
“One!! One goddamn misplaced comma...are you kidding me?” He groaned, reluctantly righting himself and pulling the keyboard into his lap once more.
“Well, fix it ya soggy noodle.” The woman paused, pulling a large cup into view and sipping from it before groaning in pleasure at the flavor of whatever her drink of choice was.
“I see you’re taking full advantage of the macchiato machine I got you.” Tae grunted, though his fierce typing belied the brief moment of a glance he’d made at her screen.
“Ya damn right I am.” Contrary to the accent she’d been speaking with, these words took on a distinctly New Yorker accent, one I’d only heard in movies and on youtube, but the change was so incredibly adorable I couldn’t help but giggle at her.
“I don’t uh...I don’t wanna interrupt but.” I glanced over to Tae who’s full attention was now on me.
“What is it Boss Lady?”
“Well, I’ve heard of like espresso machines but...a macchiato machine?”
Taehyung and Black Rose chuckled together, grinning a secret grin between the two of them.
“It’s not really like an espresso machine. Think of it like one of those industrial mixers you see in gas stations and stuff.” Tae typed into his keyboard, pulling up an image of the machine he mentioned. “It’s like a frozen yogurt machine but for macchiato mix.”
“It’s rather ingenious actually. All I had to do was get the right kind of mix and I’ve got all of my caffeine needs right here at my desk.”
“I prefer mine through a direct iv line.” A muttered voice spoke from behind the couch, drawing our attention to Yoongi who’d apparently been listening in on what we’d been talking over this whole time.
“Ah! A man after my own heart!” Black Rose grinned, giving Yoongi a thumbs up which he returned with a small smile in kind.
“Boss, we got an issue with Seokjin upstairs.” Yoongi frowned at Jungkook, though the look seemed to be more one of frustration than actual danger.
“What happened?” Jungkook stood, giving me a kiss to my forehead before heading back upstairs with Yoongi.
“Apparently his ‘second’ and I quote, ‘Is a no talent hack who couldn’t strip the paint off the broad side of a barn.”
“Overwatch?”
Yoongi sighed, “No, campaign mode on Halo…”
Taehyung snorted, returning his attention to the tv screen. “Alright. Let’s get that firewall fixed up and reverse track the signal.”
***
“Rose and Tae make a pretty incredible team huh?” Jeanette smiled softly as we watched the two work. We’d decided that speaking quieter gave us less of a chance of interrupting their focus as they worked.
“Yeah, But I kind of get the feeling there’s something between them. Don’t you?”
“Hmm…” 
I’d known Tae for only a short time, he’d come to us only a few years ago. And even though it’d been going on nearly 4 years I still couldn’t help but notice that the young man hardly ever really smiled unless Jimin was around.
Of course it could have been because they were so close in age, but it seemed like he preferred to stay by himself. With his line of expertise and the type of work he did I ended up, well not really avoiding him so much as just giving him space. But he seemed to really appreciate it. We became close in our distance. And that was okay.
“Are you seriously eating gummy bears while you’re at your computer?” Tae snorted, shaking his head as he watched his partner sheepishly grin.
“Hey, the last time we worked together like this you fussed at me because I was eating seaweed snacks over my keyboard. I’ll have no more of you fussing at me you hear!”
The two laughed, seeming to enjoy egging each other on as they worked. It felt comfortable, and was definitely a side of Taehyung I’d never seen before.
“Any luck?” Jeanette asked. She cuddled further into the blanket, seeming on edge as she watched the interaction happen.
“Does East Side ring a bell?” Black Rose’s eyes wandered her screen, eyebrows furrowed and a small frown tugging at the corners of her lips.
“Yeah...actually it does.” I grunted, pushing further  back into the comfort of the sofa.
“We were joined with them. A smaller branch of our main group that was in charge of keeping the East side of the city safe.Tension’s been high with them, even before all this mess came along.”
“I see. Well it seems like it was more than just tension.” Rose leaned back in her chair, iced coffee in hand as she pulled up an aerial view of the city for us all to see.
“This is satellite feed from a remote military camera that was monitoring the area a day ago. From the looks of things and going solely on the data I traced from Tae’s security hack, seems like these bastards have been plotting something for a while now.”
We watched intently as the feed zoomed in on the warehouse Kook, Yoongi, and I had run a rescue mission on not too long ago.
A group of people approached the front side of the building, busying themselves with something we couldn’t see while keeping a lookout for chatterers that happened to come their way. Rose accelerated the footage and we watched as, after moments more of fussing with whatever they were up to they retreated from the door.
“What the actual hell?” Tae whispered before yelping as a bright orange ball of what we could only assume was flames erupted at the door.
“So that’s how those things got in…” My body had tensed up at this point, anger pouring from me in waves as I leaned forward to glare at the tiny bodies pouring into the warehouse.
Rose cut the footage, a frown creeping onto her face as she glossed over what we now couldn’t see. “Looks like they made off with a bunch of stuff, some boxes and shit but dipped out before they could get overwhelmed. There’s no way anybody in there survived the wave of creepos that poured into the building after the fire settled.”
“Two of them survived...but not for very long.” I spat the words out bitterly, rising from the sofa and letting the blanket fall from my form as I began pacing behind the sofa.
Namjoon walked in, eyes following my every move as he walked around the sofa to sit in my place beside Jeanette, though he sat back at a respectable distance.
“I take it there’s bad news?”
Jungkook’s second in command was nothing if not astute and true to form; he'd gauged the atmosphere with no trouble.
“No oppa...shit news actually.”
I glanced over at him, eyes burning a hole into the back of his head despite the blush of red creeping up the back of his neck at the term of endearment.
“Well?” He turned to Tae, an eyebrow raised in question. But before the younger man could speak the sound of an explosion roared through the speakers, one so loud I could have sworn the ceiling above us rumbled along with the noise.
“What in the actual fuck?” I bolted over to the sofa, eyes wide as I scanned Rose’s video feed.
It seemed she’d been knocked out of view of the camera, which itself had been thrown from whatever stand she had set it up on and now lay on the ground. The only thing we could see was the trembling of the floor and a pale set of feet.
“Rose??? Rose can you hear me?” Jeanette had jumped from her seat, rushing over to the tv monitor and hastily scanning the live feed in the hopes of seeing her friend move.
“Shit...I’m okay...fuck...fucking god damn it what the hell?” A continued string of curses poured from the speakers as the feet finally began to move before disappearing from view.
Rose’s face finally came into focus as the camera lifted from the ground to focus on her dazed expression.”I don’t know what the hell that was but holy shit that fucking sucked donkey dick hole.”
“Bruh, the mouth on this woman I swear…” Namjoon shook his head, though the look of concern on his face never wavered.
“You good kid?” I asked, knowing the answer wouldn’t be pleasant.
“Yeah, though, the building I’m in probably isn’t.”
“Talk to me Jangmi, what happened?” Tae sat on his knees, seeming as if every inch of him was screaming to come to her defense.
“Well. From what my screens are telling me. Looks like those East Side assholes found me and are on their way up to my room.”
“Excuse me?” Jungkook had come down, surely drawn in by the commotion coming from the speakers that’d probably been heard all through the house. The others followed closely behind him, each wearing matching faces of either murder death stare or concern.
“I’m at the Daegu Grand Hotel. Have been for a while now. And like I said, from the looks of things the very people trying to get all of ya’lls shit are on their way up to greet me with a very impolite Korean gangster hello.”
64 notes · View notes
cheswirls · 5 years
Text
it’s your extension (let me extend) 1/6
[ small preface: this is one giant 30k oneshot. its meant to be read as a oneshot, especially with the formatting. ive divided it up for sa week bc i think it fits all the themes collectively, but on day 7, ill post it all together as a oneshot. probably definitely on another platform, ill link it here, though. each piece is around 5k words, and i cant promise each one will fit the day’s themes exactly. collectively, all the themes are in here somewhere. it’s not gonna align perfectly. 
with that all out of the way, i hope you enjoy! ive been working on this for a little over a month, now. if you recognize the au it is, you won’t notice many changes, but i like how it came out anyway. if you don’t recognize it, get ready for a ride.
also thanks to @saboace-week​ for hosting ! ]
he reminds ace of his mother.
light, blond hair hanging just past his nape; piercing eyes that hold an array of emotions, none of them harsh; fair, fair skin, and if he squints he can envision a smattering of freckles dusted onto his cheeks, not unlike his own. he cards a hand through the hair; his eyes narrow. 
he can see her.
the scar catches him off-guard. it’s not noticeable until he parts the hair a little, but then there it is, stark as day, red ragged lines breaking up the pale skin. it’s not until he takes off the old sweatshirt functioning as a pajama top that he realizes the extent of the damage.
the red ran all down his left side. cutting into his shoulder, up his neck; circling around his ribs, and he turns to see it nearly to his spine on his back; down to his thighs, to his knees, just barely on the border of red on his calves; his arm is littered with white scars and red burn marks, and he finds himself growing curious. whatever it was from, it was Big. 
it was intentional.
ace blinks and the movement echoes in the mirror, blue eyes gazing back at him. and he blanches, finally waking, finally realizing no, this was not normal, this was actually happening he brings both pale hands up to his face, tries to hide his eyes. his breath stutters.
a shrill alarm sounds and he jumps, spinning around to find a discarded phone on the bed going off. he moves over to it and it reads koala on the id and he panics and taps ‘ignore’ and lets his heart calm down.
the alarm goes off again and he jumps again and picks up the phone, almost ready to turn it off, when he finds its an actual alarm going off. ‘you’re late at this point’, it reads. ‘good luck’, it reads. 
ace turns it off and takes a seat on the bed, head falling into his hands. stringy blond locks fall around him. 
what the fuck. this isn’t what he wished for. he wanted-
and he sits up, sudden, limbs jerking in protest. he climbs the rest of the way onto the bed, towards the small window in the corner, and pulls a blind open, peering out.
a view of goa greets him. traffic, towers, teems of people absolutely everywhere.
ace slowly closes the blind, turns around, and sinks back onto the bed. he takes a deep breath, in and out. 
“THIS ISN’T WHAT I MEANT!” he shouts from the top of his lungs. when he said he wanted to live in the city, to be in the city-
when he wished he were reincarnated as-
“am i dead?” he breathes. only the quiet answers him back.
-
sabo rolls over in his sleep, prying his eyes open. he breathes out in a huff, squinting as he realizes he can see through the slats of the door. what, did he fall asleep at his desk again? and then fall out of the chair? that seemed a bit impossible, so then why . .
he tips his head, and his cheek brushes fabric, and he hums, realizing there was something under him under the floor. 
before he can process that, the door slams open. sabo’s eyes widen as he’s met with little feet, and then he looks up, meeting the gaze of a scrawny kid.
“ace, get up already!” the kid snaps. “we already ate all of the food! if you’re not ready in ten minutes, i’m leaving you.”
he slams the door back into place, and sabo lies there, eyes blown and mind wide awake.
he’s so taken in by the kid’s words that for a second he finds himself scrambling up, counting down the seconds, remembering the time limit.
then he turns around and realizes he was asleep on a futon and he was in a wooden room and he trips on his way to look out the window before grasping the sill, raising his head above it, and his jaw drops as he’s met with a sprawling lake view, and of a whole community painted into the sides of a mountain. no, not a mountain, his mind helpfully supplies. the sides of a crater.
he blinks and his gaze zooms until he’s gazing at his own reflection, except it’s not him in the window. it’s a boy with tanned skin and long, black hair that fell just to his shoulders. they were broad, and he frowns, looking down as he runs a hand down the washboard chest, bare. damn. his eyes catch on a red band looped around his wrist, tied in a sloppy knot. he tugs and it comes loose, unraveling easily, and he hums as he spies a few other colors near the end.
“ace! let’s go!” a voice calls from somewhere deeper in the house, and sabo scrambles to his feet again, dropping the band on the ground. he swivels his head until he spots a uniform hanging from a closet door. it’s nondescript, so he hopes there’s only one school in this small town, else he go to the wrong one.
. . on second thought, with the kid leading him, maybe not.
he patters over to it, pausing once he grabs the hangers to look at his reflection in an actual mirror. oh. okay. so this was actually happening. he was in the body of someone named-
he stops. blinks. no. this had to be a dream, right?
he throws the white shirt over his head, tugging the collar down, and hums to himself in affirment as he works on the pants. right. this was a dream. had to be. 
he’s slipping on the jacket when the kid barges in again, comes over, grabs him by the back of the jacket, and begins to shove him out of the room. “now! come on! we gotta go!”
“o-okay,” he voices, marveling at the change in pitch to what he was used to. deeper, slightly. he spies the red band again and lunges for it, tumbling out of the kid’s hold for a moment. “wait,” he breathes, grasping it, and then the kid’s on him again, pushing him towards the door.
“ace!” he whines. “come on!”
“luffy!” a voice calls from somewhere below. they exit the room and sabo spies a figure near the bottom of a staircase. “you’re going to be late!”
“coming!” luffy yells, still pushing him as sabo struggles to get his bearings, still grasping at the change in scenery. he clutches the red band tightly.
-
ace stumbles from the room, marveling at the change in height. the guy had a few on him, that was for sure. he moves down the hall, passing the simple furnishings until he’s in the frame of the kitchen entry, nose twitching at the smell of stale food.
a woman looks up from her phone at the small table for two, eyeing him for a moment before humming and looking back down. after another moment, she removes herself from the chair, shuffling around some dishes. “what was that shouting about earlier?” she asks, gesturing for ace to take her seat. he does, sliding down and picking up the extra pair of chopsticks.
“uh, nothin’,” ace mutters, mouth already full of leftover food.
“right.” the woman rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling a moment later. “well, i’m out. there should be another train leaving in half an hour. you have until then to get ready.”
“‘kay,” ace mumbles, nodding as she waves and exits the room. a moment later, a door shuts from the end of the hall. ace finishes the food soon after and sighs, setting the chopsticks down. 
school, then. 
he wanders back into the bedroom and approaches the uniform hanging from the back of a chair. the first issue was getting there, which . .
he glances at the phone. koala would know, right?
but, as soon as he thinks it, he lets the thought go. 
he opts to take a picture of the crest stitched to the blazer instead, doing a reverse image search to determine which goa school it belonged to. a result pops up pretty handily, and he hums, putting it into a map. oh. so, it was pretty far. he glances to the window again.
after a moment, he searches the map for the nearest train station. not close either.
  . . . his gaze moves back to the window.
ace sighs, slumping where he stood. there was no way he was catching that next train. he’d be lucky if he made it there by noon.
why was city life so hard?
after he’s gotten dressed and grabbed a bag, he stuffs whatever he can think of down into it. phone charger. notebook. wallet. pencil. sketchbook? he blinks, eyeing it for a moment, then shoves it in as well. no harm, right?
he moves back across the apartment and pauses at the mouth of the kitchen, gaze fixed on the small dishes still set out on the table. sighing, he slides the backpack off his shoulder and steps forward. right. there was no gramps to clean them up, so he’d have to do it himself then.
he pauses again after locking the front door, keys halfway shoved into his pocket. he didn’t even know this guy’s name. well, it probably wouldn’t be long until he did, but hopefully it wouldn’t cause any problems.
catching the train is a rush. ace sits in a seat very close to the door, sighing as everything begins to move. while he waits, he takes out the phone again and looks through it, trying to find anything to help him out. he ends up tapping on a social media app, and when the screen loads, hums.
“sabo, huh?” he mutters under his breath. okay. he could work with that.
-
sabo doesn’t have to worry about luffy guiding him, because they run into some people he apparently should know.
“ace!”
the word is a single, concise syllable, spoken loud and with momentum, and, more importantly, from right behind him. sabo jumps, just about crawls out of his skin, and spins around to see a girl just about his height looking at him funny, lips pursed, and a hand poised to chop his head. he steps back more, glancing over at luffy, who huffs out a sigh.
“i’ll meet you at home,” he says, motioning to a fork in the path ahead. one slopes down, curving a little around the cliffside, and the other continues upward, towards the crest. “whatever’s going on, i hope you’re over it by then.” with another odd glance, luffy tightens his hold on his backpack straps and takes off down the path. sabo is left alone, and turns to watch as a boy approaches the girl, and therefore him, as well, pushing a bike at his side.
“nothing’s going on?” he mutters, even though that’s an obvious lie. whatever he’s doing, he’s doing it wrong.
“are you sure?” the girl says, crossing her arms. “because it looks like you couldn’t even be bothered to brush your hair this morning.”
sabo blinks, reaching up to tug on one of the black strands. he thought it’d been naturally unruly. guess not.
“whatever. let’s go already.” she turns and nods to the other boy, then grabs sabo by the arm and pulls him into a walk alongside them. her eyes turn down and she makes a little noise in the back of her throat. “you brought your ribbon and you’re not even using it?”
sabo glances down as well, spying his impulse grab hanging from his hand. he lifts it. “ribbon?” it didn’t look like it.
the girl shrugs, waving a hand. “might as well be. look, if you didn’t have time to do your hair, you can just say so. but we’re not even there yet. i have a mirror if you need it.”
she fumbles for her bag, searching through it, and then frowns. “nevermind. hey, kidd, you got one?”
“always,” he boasts, passing over a small pocket mirror with ease. sabo takes it, frowning. he looks down and attempts to pat the hair down, and then glances again to the band in his other hand. so, if it functioned like a ribbon . .
well. that made sense.
he hands the mirror back and holds the band in his teeth, using his hands to situate the long black hair. then he grabs the red with one hand and strings it around, until it held the hair in a loose knot. he glances over at the other two after finishing, waiting for approval. the girl shrugs after a moment. 
“good enough, i guess.”
sabo sighs out in relief, and then they’re in front of the school and kidd’s parking his bike and something chimes in the far distance. they grab for each of his arms and pull him through the front doors, moving quickly to a classroom. it’s not until they’re inside that he realizes another dilemma. people were still moving in, and there were open seats.
he reaches back to grab the girl’s arm, a small look of panic fixed on his face despite his best efforts. “where do i sit . . ?”
her eyes widen, and she stares at him. and stares. stares.
then, very calmly, she blinks and points to a desk near a window, almost in the corner of the room. sabo just nods, head down, and moves toward it.
-
ace moves down the hall slowly, still paging through a twitter feed on the phone. there were background shots of a classroom, and it had a high window, which meant the second floor. if only there was a glimpse of a number, then he’d really be set-
“sabo!” a shout echoes down the hall, making ace throw his head up. a redhead marches toward him, looking pissed, and he blanches, turning the phone off and trying to straighten out.
“uh, whatever i did, i can explain,” he says, because ace has always been about resolving conflict. then he mentally slaps himself, because that was the worst possible thing he could’ve said. he didn’t know the first thing about sabo, much less what he did to piss off the girl so much.
“you better!” she huffs, stabbing a finger into his chest. ace takes it with a wince. “ignoring my call like that! how dare you.”
so it was his fault, then. “i thought it was my alarm,” he says quickly. “it went off right after your call. sorry.” okay, so maybe not exactly true, but it would work. he eyes the girl in a new light. so this was koala.
she crosses her arms over her chest. “which one? had to be the ‘you’re late anyway, so hurry up’ one, right? how can you be here at noon?” she sighs. “it’s lunch, for god’s sake!”
“sorry,” ace says again.
her lips purse. “fine. i won’t press. c’mon, it’s stuffy in here, let’s eat outside.”
eat. his expression changes as he realizes. koala glances at him and rolls her eyes.
“you forgot lunch, didn’t you?”
he did, and he’s kinda hungry. he claps his hands together. “please share?”
“you’re lucky i like you,” koala mutters, jerking a door open.
koala insists he come to a cafe with her after school, and ace’s mouth waters at the thought. the closest they had out in fuusha was an old vending machine on top of the crest. inside, it’s crowded with people, but koala squeezes them into a two-seater and props up a menu, then begins rambling about the day. ace tunes her out, eyes widening as he glances at all the pictures. he wanted to try them all.
“that’s a lot of money,” koala comments, and he realizes he’d spoken aloud. ace looks up, then digs in his bag, looking into his wallet. he lets out a sigh.
“yeah, guess you’re right.” he hums, flipping the page and spotting a piece of cheesecake dripping with strawberry sauce. his mouth waters again. “then, i’ll just take this one.”
halfway through their meal, ace’s phone pings. he picks it up carelessly, smiling, too busy enjoying his cake. the text makes him reconsider.
koala pauses in her movements upon noticing his expression. “what’s wrong?”
“i’m late for work,” ace tells her.  apparently.
“oh, you had a shift?” she waves him off. “go, then. i don’t mind.”
“yea, thanks.” he stands, pocketing his phone, and stuffs the last of the cake into his mouth in a big bite. koala doesn’t comment.
he walks off a few paces, spins around on his heel, and comes back to tap koala on the shoulder. “uh, where do i work again?”
her brows raise to her hairline.
-
sabo wakes slowly.
he’s balanced on the edge of the bed, curled up like he doesn’t know there’s supposed to be a drop. it’s jarring, and as soon as his phone begins to vibrate, his body jerks and he’s on the floor, crashed in a heap with the comforter curled around his legs.
with a moderate groan, he reaches up and silences his phone.
the door opens a moment later, as he’s rubbing his head. red hair is his only giveaway before shanks is fully in the room, peering down at him. “whoa there, kid. took a tumble, huh?”
“i’m good,” sabo mumbles, sitting up. he blinks, screwing his eyes to cast the sleep away. “had the strangest dream.”
“let’s talk about it over breakfast, kay?” he jerks a thumb over his head. “makino has it ready.”
makino is already gone, too, apparently, because it’s just him and shanks at the table. it only sits two anyway, so it’s not often all three of them eat together. still.
sabo squints, picking up his chopsticks and trying to recall. “i was some kid living out in a mountain village for a day. had an annoying little brother and everything.”
shanks hums, swallowing his bite of food. “sounds boring.”
sabo snorts. “great, thanks for your input.” he pauses again. “it just . . felt so real.”
later, sabo will go back to his room and pick apart his backpack, confusion on his face for every random item he pulls out. he pauses at one point, hand wrapped loosely around the spine of his sketchbook. definitely didn’t remember taking that out of his room. what did he even draw, he thinks, flipping through to the last filled page-
he stops. his hand trembles. the forgotten page flips over, and the front half of the book hangs limp in the air. he stares at the page.
‘who are you?’ is written there, in big, blocky letters, scratched over and over by a worn pen.
-
“are you gonna play with your hair again?” luffy asks, entirely unimpressed, as he pulls open the door to ace’s room, looking to his elder brother warily. ace blinks the remaining sleep from his eyes, sits up fully.
“what?”
luffy huffs. “nevermind.” he begins to slide the door shut. “at least you’re up today.”
ace frowns at the comment, then immediately turns to look out the window. the sun was barely peeking out over the edge of the crest, as usual when he woke. he sighs and stumbles to his feet, electing to ignore luffy’s comment. 
breakfast with garp is a quiet affair. he eyes ace warily, but doesn’t say anything out of the ordinary, more of the usual. ace has to pull luffy away from the table, again, per usual. he sighs as he closes the front door, wrapping his scarf tighter around his neck. luffy grumbles at his side, wiping rice from the corner of his mouth.
he takes luffy halfway to school, then watches as he runs down the path with zoro and nami, sprinting in a race to see who can reach the grounds first. ace continues up the slope by himself, and doesn’t stop until he’s sliding his classroom door open, tugging his scarf a little looser in the heated environment. 
he’s sitting his bag down on his desk when the door slams open, and he turns calmly while a few others jump, entirely expecting this kind of entrance. lami pinpoints him immediately and stalks up to him, kidd not far behind. ace stands at attention, turning to face her-
and makes a noise of protest as she grabs his cheeks, pulling his face closer to hers for easier inspection. 
it’s a few tense moments of silence before he frowns, features distorted. “can i help you?” he says, words muffled by the pull of his lips. lami’s frown mirrors his own, and she releases him.
“are you back to normal?” she says, hands on her hips. ace only turns to look at kidd behind her, silently asking for help. the edhead steps up with a muffled snort.
“you were . . weird, yesterday,” he admits. “your hair was a mess, you were all spaced out, you couldn’t remember where you sat-”
“you got all of crocus’ questions right!” lami snaps. “his insanely hard, out-of-thin-air pop questions! you got them all right. answered like it wasn’t even a challenge. like you knew the ins and outs of the material already.” she crosses her arms. “you better not upstage us all again today.”
ace blanches. “what? you’re lying. that’s impossible.” and his hair . . ? he reaches up, fingering the braided cord that held the black locks in a high ponytail. 
lami shakes her head. “no, i’m serious. you were weird yesterday.” she echoes kidd’s words and the redhead nods, confirming. 
“well, whatever,” he grumbles, turning away, a bit put-out. “i’m fine now. okay? let’s just forget about it.”
the door opens, and in ambles crocus, old hips still in desperate need of replacement. he takes a stand behind the podium and pauses as he finds ace. “hm. portgas.”
ace lifts his chin, eyes narrowing. after a few tense moments, their teacher turns away, looking back down to his papers. everyone finds their seats after that. 
-
‘who are you?’ echoes over and over in sabo’s mind, as much as he can allow it. school is vicious today, the teachers going hard and not leaving anyone a moment’s rest. it’s not until everything is done for the day that sabo can break away, and that’s when koala approaches him, a wary look marring her gaze.
“what’s up with being late yesterday?” her eyes narrow as she comes to a full stop right in front of him. “y’know, if you were gonna show up halfway through the day, why’d you even come at all?”
“late?” sabo blinks. as he could recall, he was here a half hour early, like today, like always. 
“yeah.” she huffs. “you were late to work, too. listen, are you feeling better, at least?”
sabo’s hairs begin to stand. “yesterday,” he says, very slowly, “i didn’t have a shift.” 
“what?” koala’s eyes begin to ignite. “then you just ditched me? what the hell, sabo!”
“what are you on?” sabo snaps back, trying to make sense of it all. “we were together all afternoon. we split crepes! remember?”
koala’s mouth opens, but she remains silent. her brows scrunch, and the fire dies out. “that was monday,” she recalls. 
sabo shrugs, still off-put. “yeah?”
“sabo, it’s wednesday.”
he blinks. blinks again. “no-” he begins, but before he can finish, koala’s whipped her phone out and is showing him the date.
he stands very still. a shiver runs through his body.
“why . . can’t i remember?” 
-
lami and kidd wrangle him away for the afternoon, walking while the bite of the cold wasn’t too bad. unluckily for him, the path they take leads into a head-on collision with one of dragons’ rallies. ace can hear his speech before he sees the crowd, and then he’s hissing to himself in panic, ducking down behind kidd’s lanky form. the redhead scoffs, but doesn’t move.
“i guess it is election time,” lami notes, gaze wandering over. 
“wonder why he bothers,” kidd says. “he’s bound to get reelected anyway.”
ace frowns, eyes still facing the ground. he doesn’t want to hear dragon, or see him, but most importantly, he doesn’t want dragon to see him.
a pause in the speech reaches his ears. lami moves closer to the pair. “hey, heads up-” she begins to mutter.
“ace!” dragon calls, and he closes his eyes, jerking to a stop. slowly, his eyes move until he meets his father’s over the heads of the crowd. he doesn’t look very pleased. “straighten out already!” he calls.
ace forces out an exhale and moves out from behind kidd, standing taller. he turns his gaze back to the road and starts moving, quicker this time. he feels dragon’s eyes on him all the while, but what’s more, the eyes of the crowd as they turn to face him, as they turn to witness the town mayor mocking his eldest yet again-
“don’t let him bother you,” lami says, once they’re out of earshot. she turns to kidd, giving him a pointed look. “hey, let’s go to your mom’s shop?”
“diner,” kidd corrects. he frowns, knowing more than anything that it wasn’t a question. but, well, it was still too early for dad to be home. “sure,’ he sighs, giving in. immediately, ace perks up at the prospect of food.
“sacha!” lami calls, just as they burst through the doors. an older woman comes out from the back room, wiping her hands with a towel. her gaze brightens as it lands on the three.
“oh! come in, come in.” she puts her hands on her hips as they all pile into a table. “so, how was school?”
“horrible!” ace groans. “crocus kept asking me all these questions i couldn’t answer. and only me!”
from beside him, kidd snickers. lami pokes ace with her elbow. “it’s because you were a smartass yesterday.”
ace huffs, slumping to the tabletop. “sacha, they’re being mean to me!” he whines. “please, the only thing that can help is food! please feed me!”
sacha rolls her eyes at the act. “sure. whatever you say.” she winks to the other two, already turning towards the back. “i’ll bring some stuff right out.”
“thanks, mom!” kidd calls. lami echoes his words, and then they’re both turning to ace, who’s still slumped against the table.
“hey,” lami says suddenly. “fuck dragon. don’t think about it.”
ace hums, head still buried in his arms.
if only.
-
sabo has the dream again.
he sets upright, and everything is at a lower angle, and pieces of stiff, black hair fall in front of his eyes. he hums, thinks nothing of it. okay. so it was a do-over dream. maybe he could do better this time.
luffy opens his door with a short bang some time later, and pauses for a moment to eye him with trepidation. sabo cocks his head to face him, but otherwise continues bouncing his newly-acquired black locks. he couldn’t help it -he’d never had hair this long. 
“breakfast!” luffy snaps. he closes the door with the same amount of force he’d opened it with, and it hits the frame harshly. sabo’s hand drops from his hair, finally.
breakfast is, unfortunately, not a quiet affair. sabo has to fight over rice, fish, soup -everything, really- until it’s all properly dished out. a little radio in the corner of the room blares out about town hall news, and sabo cocks his head to it as he nibbles on some meat, swiping his chopsticks out to keep Luffy from his rice.
“also, in regards to the upcoming mayoral election-”
garp has already stood up by this point, and pulls the plug on the old machine before the announcer could continue. he comes back to the table in the newly quiet atmosphere, and luffy sets down elbows up on the glass top, sighing.
“you really should make up with him already,” he grumbles. “both of you,” he adds, turning that glare to sabo. sabo only blinks, not knowing the context of the words, and chooses to resume eating in quiet rather than respond.
“it’s an adult problem, kid,” garp grunts, setting down his empty bowl. “go on, now. get ready for school.”
luffy lets out a long-lastings sigh as he throws himself to his feet. “right,” he says, letting the word drag out, and drags himself from the room. sabo sets down his rice bowl after his last bite, nodding to garp.
“thanks for the food,” he mumbles, standing as well. garp grunts, but grabs for sabo before he can pass by completely. sabo pauses, looking over his shoulder.
“don’t forget, the ceremony is in a few days.”
that’s all he says, then he releases sabo. he doesn’t know the context, again, so he just nods and hurries up the stairs back to ace’s room.
the red band isn’t around his wrist this time, and it takes a bit of digging around, but he does find it in a spare drawer. he takes a brush through the thick locks, then binds it into a low ponytail at the base of his neck. if a knot wasn’t right last time, maybe this was. he uses the band in place of an elastic, pulling it tight, and nods once he’s satisfied.
luffy is waiting for him downstairs. he bounces on his feet, using both hands and a loud voice to say bye to their grandpa. sabo just nods, and garp nods back, letting them go. 
lami and kidd run into him before the pathway splits, and luffy looks on in indifference until lami has him on her shoulders, and then he’s squealing with delight or annoyance -sabo can’t tell. it only takes a moment for her to set him on the handlebars of kidd’s bike, and the redhead breaks out into a jog, balancing luffy, who does enjoy this one -evident by him throwing his arms over his head and shouting in joy. lami loops sabo’s arm through her own and they follow at their own pace. when the pathway splits, they help luffy down and he waves them off, continuing towards his own school.
sabo finds his seat by the window, but once class starts, he can’t focus. it’s all stuff he’s learned already, so he spends time instead jotting stuff down in a blank page of the notebook. ace’s family was two people. his brother, luffy, and his grandfather. there’s a third person him and ace share in conflict with. he has two close friends, lami and kidd. kidd is the son of a electrical contractor -the guy who controlled all power out here in the town. which, technically speaking, seemed to be out in the middle of nowhere. the high school sat over the ridge, and it was all sabo could see for miles around -that was, nothing but rolling hills. 
“portgas,” a voice says gruffly, enough to grate sabo’s ears, and he looks up to find the entire class staring at him. his brows furrow, until he meet the teacher’s gaze, locked on him. sabo swallows, setting down his pen. 
“yes?”
crocus lets out an overdue sigh. “nice of you to finally respond. define ‘twilight’ for me.”
sabo blinks, then stands in one clean motion, nodding. “it’s . . a time between night and day,” he finally settles on, unsure of what the man was looking for. he’d gotten all the questions right last time, but they only served to annoy him. and also bring on more questions. sabo wasn’t exactly sure how to respond here to get it right this time.
crocus grins, and sabo feels a little nervousness run about. “not quite what i was looking for.” he gestures with his hand, and sabo sits down, confusion growing.
“‘twilight’ is neither day nor night. it’s a time when the two become blurred. where all the funny stuff happens. afterlight, in other words. right before dusk.”
“what about half-light?” kidd pipes up, hand slightly raised. crocus allows the outburst, humming.
“that’s more local dialect, but, yes.”
sabo lets down his guard again, and goes back to doodling, scribbling notes in the columns. 
he finds the diary after school.
it’s a small pocketbook, easily overlooked. call sabo curious, though, for upturning the room. ace is organized, and his small script is neat. reading through the entries doesn’t help, though. sabo sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. guess he had to do this on his own. well, for a do-over dream, he thinks he did rather well. if it happened again, maybe he’d get to finish learning what he only discovered this time around.
he’s settling down on the futon when a stray thought comes to mind. the words ‘who are you?’ scribbled in his sketchbook hit him out of nowhere, and sabo stands on the thin matress, gaze falling to the desk in the corner.
after a moment, he walks over, feet carrying him and hand reaching out for a small marker. he hesitates for a moment, then presses the ink to his skin, writing his name carefully.
-
sabo jerks awake, head fuzzy. shanks opens his door at the same time, and the blond has a conniption, about doing a front-somersault off the mattress. he lands on the ground in a heap, groaning.
“relax, kid,” shanks says. “it’s just me.”
sabo’s leg twitches. he lies there for a moment, only vaguely thinking about going back to sleep.
“ . . you okay?”
his phone starts ringing and sabo forces himself up to silence it. “fine,” he mutters, waving shanks off. with a shrug, the redhead leaves, closing the door behind him.
sabo’s gaze is fixed to his arm, now that he’s stopped waving it. his brow furrows, and he grasps his right with his left hand, bringing it closer. he squints.
there’s writing scribbled onto the skin. ‘sabo?’ it reads. ‘who are you? what are you?’
it was a dream.
right?
makino frowns at him as he enters the kitchen. “don’t cause trouble today,” she says quietly. sabo blinks, eyes widening and heart racing.
“what? what did i do?” he stammers. she only looks at him again, sighs quietly, and exits the room. down the hall, the front door closes.
“what did i do?” sabo asks koala, who frowns upon spotting him in the hall before class was due to start. 
“you got home too late, is my guess,” she muses. “makino called me, y’know. wondering where you were.”
sabo blanches. “did i have a shift?”
“ i think so?” she squints. “you headed off in a hurry. saw something, i guess. are you okay?”
he waves her off. “fine, fine.”
she looks at him for another moment before shoving the door open. “right.”
sabo goes straight home before his shift at the restaurant. on impulse, he flips to the back spread of his sketchbook, where the last note was. his eyes widen.
“i can’t believe i got to stop a real-life goa robbery attempt last night,” he reads. “sorry, i may have gotten scuffed up?” sabo takes a step back, and the sketchbook falls from his hands. it’s loud when it hits the floor. “what the fuck?” he breathes.
he pads over to the mirror, but there’s no marks on his face. without any airs, he strips of his shirt, twisting this way and that. ah. there, on his left side, was a small patch of bruising. luckily for him, it was on his burns, where all the skin was nerve-dead. he couldn’t feel a thing.
suddenly feeling lightheaded, sabo falls to his knees. his right hand comes up to trace the bruising.
“oh, sabo!”
he turns on his heel, empty plates balanced in outstretched hands. robin walks over the last few steps. “yes?”
“thanks for the other night.” she nods. “and for making sure i got home safe. that was really nice of you.”
the pieces connect, rapid-fire, and he works hard to only nod back. “no problem,” he murmurs, then ducks quickly through the door to the back. so, robin was the one almost mugged. she must live pretty far, for him to take her and be back late enough to cause makino to worry.  . . . that would also explain the weird looks he received from his other co-workers when he arrived. 
sabo sighs, taking a moment to pull his arms on top of his head, open his airway. then he’s poked in the back with a ladle, and his eyes open back up. moment over. he turns to see thatch eyeing him, a lazy grin on his face.
“what’s got you worked up?” he asks. before sabo can even think about not replying to his cheshire grin, zeff is yelling for him from across the kitchen. he moves quickly, picking up dessert trays and swinging out of the room once more.
he gets a text from shanks that has him calling as soon as he’s clocked out, pressing his phone between his shoulder and chin. it takes one ring for the redhead to pick up. “yes?”
“sabo! come straight home today, okay?”
“yeah, got it.” he sighs. “sorry . . about yesterday.”
“nah, don’t worry about it.” shanks pauses, and sabo can picture him physically waving the words off. “i know you didn’t mean harm. still, makino’s a little worried, so do her this favor.”
“got it. see you soon.”
sabo pockets his phone and pulls out his metro card in place of it, stepping fully into the train station. his head is spinning. 
it was a dream, right?
-
ace finds the diary, and it makes him sad before it gives him answers.
so i don’t forget again.
he’s found three, similar, pressed into the back of a crammed bookshelf. all of them have the same title. he finds his fingertips pressing into the burn scar around his eye. was it to do with this? was it all part of the same thing?
the last entries of the diary confirm his worries. sabo wasn’t aware of what was going on. he was slowly realizing it, but slowly was bad for ace, who knew from the first event what was happening.
i’m not dead. we’re switching bodies.
he was switching bodies with sabo triste, a boy his age living out in goa with his two guardians, makino and shanks. ace goes to sleep, and wakes up as sabo; he’d spent more time as the blond this week than he had himself.
‘stop writing in my sketchbook!!!’ is written right under his script on the same page, and ace traces the words carefully. he takes a pen and writes, right underneath, ‘surely one page is okay.’
he hesitates, then he writes, out to the side - ‘it’s not a dream.’
it can’t be a dream anymore.
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yuckitup-jwd · 5 years
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Historical people answer the question - Why did the chicken cross the road?
Douglas Adams: Forty-Two
Earnest Angsley: To be HAYELED! in the name o'Jayeeezus!
Marcus Antonius: The evil that chickens do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones.
Any Philosophy 101 Professor: Why not?
Any Calculus Professor: The road, if expressed in the form (y2-y1)/(x2-x1) is approximate for cases where lim(y2-y1)/(x2-x1) as (x2-x1) -> 0, is represented by the derivative, or rate of change, of the road with respect to the chicken, such that the value of the chicken may be assumed equal to the value of (y2-y1)/(x2-x1), for small values of roads.
Jane Austen: Because it is a truth universally acknowledged that a single chicken, being posessed of a good fortune and presented with a good road, must be desirous of crossing.
Aristotle: To actualize its potential.
Neil Armstrong: One small step for chickenkind, one giant leap for poultry.
Arthur, King of the Britons: What do you mean? African or European chickens?
Paul Atreidies: What name have you for the chicken shaped stain upon your road? That shall be the name that you shall call me!
Lord Baden-Powell: Because as a Chicken Scout, it needed the Road-Crossing Merit Badge.
Bilbo Baggins: Oh what I wouldn't give to back in my nice, warm Hobbit-hole! I hope I never have to lay eyes on such a thing as that chicken again!
Baldrick: It had a cunning plan.
The Band: To take a load off....
The Bandit, in The Treasure of The Sierra Madre: "Chickens? Chickens? We don't need no stinkin' chickens!"
Clive Barker: He was drawn to the road, and he didn't so much cross the road as the road crossed him. And once across, the chicken entered into a frightening void, filled only with the screams of a thousand agonized souls. The hands of doom reached out of the blackness, strangling the chicken, smothering him, suffocating him. He could not escape, as no one who crosses the road can escape. He was now a prisoner of the Cenobytes, doomed to an eternity of pain.
Roseanne Barr: Urrrrrp. What chicken?
The Beatles: To be free as a bird!
Lavrenti Beria (ex-head of the KGB): This is a State Secret -- we have informants everywhere.
Bill The Cat Ack. Thpppbt
Blackadder: Queenie: Because I told it to. Percy: To acquire a hunk of purest green Lord Flasheart: To DOOOOOOOOO IT!
Lucien Bouchard: So that it could be SEPARATE!
Ben Bova: To be reunited with beautiful grey-eyed Athena, the woman he has loved for all of time
Brisco (Law and Order): For A Bagel
Bruce, Bruce, Bruce, Bruce, Bruce and Bruce: To grab a Fosters and get away from the poofters!
Buddha: If you ask this question, you deny your own chicken-nature.
Archie Bunker: I don't care what them there chickens do, as long as they stay on THEIR side of the street!
Bugs Bunny: What's up, cluck?
Robert Burns: Fair Fa Your Honest Sonsie Face Great Chieftain O' The Chicken Race The blackened road 'ahind ye said Ye best run quick ere ye be deid!
George Bush: If it did it was out of the loop
George Bush: (again) It could see the thousand points of headlights....
Rhett Butler: Frankly my dear, it didn't give a damn!
C3PO (1): Sir, may I remind you that I am fluent in 6,000,000 forms of communication and this chicken has not... shutting up, sir.
C3PO (2): Sir, according to my calculations, the odds of a chicken successfully navigating a road are 3,750 to 1 against.
Caesar: It came, it saw, it crossed.
Joseph Campbell: In primitive cultures, we can find many such examples of the chicken motif that cannot be dismissed as mere coincidence. For instance, I am reminded of an old Navajo legend in which a buffalo crosses a stream to "come" to the other side -- an obvious negative language devised to prepare tribesmen for a transcendental experience. Similarly, the Hindus believe in savanaya, or a sacred cow that leaps over a chasm on Thursdays. Through metaphorical interpretation, we are led to realize that all examples suggest an attainable higher state of consciousness like that of Nietzsche's ubermench, or superman, as outlined in his novel "Thus Spoke Zarathustra."
Albert Camus: Seeing that an indifferent world lied on all sides of the road, the chicken knew it would be absurd not too cross, and for that moment, the chicken knew what it was to really be alive. It was if the bird had been asleep its entirely up until this choice was put before him. So, with a newfound determination and a smile, the chicken valiently crossed the road only to be put out of its mercy by an eighteen wheeler.
Candide: To cultivate its garden.
Johnny Carson: Let me tell you, it was so cold at that farm... Ed McMahon: How cold was it? Johnny Carson: It was so cold, that the chickens were mugging the sheep to get wool for sweaters!
Raymond Chandler: Across these mean streets a chicken must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid. He is the hero; he is everything. He must be a complete chicken and a common chicken and yet an unusual chicken. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a chicken of honor - by instinct, by inevitability, withough thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best chicken in his world and a good enough chicken for any world.
Charlie X: Because it didn't want to STAY....STAY....STAY....STAY....STAY...
Cheech (or Chong): Just to be there, man.
The Chicken: I am crossing the road to block traffic as a protest against ..." (thump).
Commander Chikotay: I'm not sure but I can find out. That chicken is my animal spirit guide.
Noam Chomsky: To manufacture consent
Tom Clancy: The Mark 84 gargleblaster that the chicken carried, at the heart of which was an inferior ex-Soviet excimer laser system, had insufficient range to allow the chicken to carry out its mission from this side of the road.
John Cleese From Fawlty Towers: Manuel from Barcelona: "Que?" Basil: "You know, a chicken crossing the road...." Manuel: "Que?" Basil: [looking it up in a dictionary], "Un Pollo..." Manuel: interrupting, "No, No we out of chicken.." * WHAP!!*
John Cleese: Because it was very silly.
John Cleese: (again) This isn't a chicken license, you know! It's a dog license with the word "Dog" crossed out and "Chicken" written in in crayon.
John Cleese: (#3) This Chicken is no more. It has ceased to function. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. It's a stiff. If it wasn't nailed to the road it'd be pushing up daisies. It's snuffed it. It's metabolic processes are now history. It's bleeding demised. It's rung down the curtain, shuffled off the mortal coil and joined the bleeding Choir Invisible. This is an Ex-Chicken.
Bill Clinton: What?
Bill Clinton (again): The chicken was persuaded to cross the road by the Democratic congress. It is now returning to the middle of the road
Joseph Conrad: Mistah Chicken, he dead.
John Constantine: Because it'd made a bollocks of things over on this side of the road and figured it'd better get out right quick.
Alastair Cooke: Good Evening, and welcome to Masterpiece Theatre. Tonight, we present the epic British drama "How The Chicken Went," based on the 1843 novel by Herbert T. Poultry, and adapted for the screen by Joanna Drumstick. Starring Susan Hampshire as the Chicken, and Anthony Hopkins as the evil and unrepentant diner, Borstrom, this elegant period piece explores the mores and morality of a society in which ordinary chickens had to face their destiny of crossing the road to meet their fate at the hands of the monied upper classes, regardless of their own ambitions or desires...
Shiela Copps (Deputy Prime Minister of Canada): BECAUSE I SCREAMED AT IT REAL LOUD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sheila Copps: Okay, I know that the chicken promised it would cross the road if the Liberals failed to eliminate the GST, but it was a stupid promise to make and the chicken deeply regrets ever making it. However, the chicken will not be crossing the road because to do so would cost tax payers $500,000.
Sheila Copps (a few days later): Alright! Alright! The chicken will cross the road like it promised. But it'll be right back again. Now leave me alone.
Howard Cosell: It may very well have been one of the most astonishing events to grace the annals of history. An historic, unprecendented avian biped with the temerity to attempt such an herculean achievement formerly relegated to homo sapien pedestrians is truly a remarkable occurrence.
Jacques Ives Cousteau: Zee cheecken, unaware of zee dangare beehind heem, crosses zee street. Weezout warning, zee Porsche strikes, and zee balance of zee nature ees maintained.
Stephen R. Covey: When the chicken and the road can work together for the win-win, the result is synergy!
Jean Cretien, Prime Minister of Canada: "It wasn't a chicken, you know, it was an Inuit carving of a loon. But the RCMP should have been there anyway..."
Aleister Crowley: Because it was its True Will to do so.
Salvador Dali: The Fish.
Stephanie Daniels: It was the turtle's day off.
Darwin: It was the logical next step after coming down from the trees.
Commander Data: I do not know. Although I have compared all of my 437 billion data points relating to chickens and roads, there is no possitive correlation between the two.
W. Edwards Demming: But is one chicken crossing one road of statistical importance? Only once we have established an historical baseline of chickens with respect to roads, with calculated upper and lower control limits, can we make that determination.
Arthur Dent: Are you sure the chicken is from Beetelgeuse, and not from Gilford after all?
Jacques Derrida: Any number of contending discourses may be discovered within the act of the chicken crossing the road, and each interpretation is equally valid as the authorial intent can never be discerned, because structuralism is DEAD, DAMMIT, DEAD!
Rene Descartes: It had sufficient reason to believe it was dreaming anyway.
Descartes (again): The chicken was merely a machine and was crossing due to the deterministic nature of the universe.
Emily Dickinson: Because it could not stop for death.
Bob Dole: Do you know that before that chicken had gotten across the road, its cellular phone was ringing and there was a lawyer on the other end asking if it would like to sue the city for not putting up a traffic light.
Bob Dylan: How many roads must a chicken travel down, before they call him a man?
E.T.: Chicken, phone home
Ecclesiastes (1): For every fowl, there is a season. A time for garlic, a time for sage...
Ecclesiastes (2): This bird is meaningless.
Wyatt Earp: Well, chicken, are you gonna do something, or just stand there and bleed?
Eeyore: If it did. Which I doubt. Not that it matters.
Albert Einstein: Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the chicken depends on your frame of reference.
T.S. Eliot: It's not that they cross, but that they cross like chickens.
Harlan Ellison: Because he had no beak and must scream.
Emergency Medical Holographic Doctor on U.S.S. Voyager: Maybe it was trying to state the nature of a medical emergency.
Ralph Waldo Emerson: It didn't cross the road; it transcended it.
Epicurus: For fun.
Basil Fawlty: Oh, don't mind that chicken. It's from Barcelona.
Sybil Fawlty: BASIL! Why is there a CHICKEN in my hotel?
Dr. Johnny Fever: To escape from the Phone Cops!
Fiver (from Watership Down): Don't you see it? The sky has turned to blood, the field has turned to fire... THE CHICKENS! DON'T YOU SEE THE CHICKENS?
Gerald R. Ford: It probably fell from an airplane and couldn't stop its forward momentum.
Sigmund Freud: The chicken obviously was female and obviously interpreted the pole on which the crosswalk sign was mounted as a phallic symbol of which she was envious, selbstverstaendlich.
Robert Frost: To cross the road less traveled by.
Barney Fyfe: Now Andy, let me tell you a thing or two about chickens. Chickens cross roads in those other counties, but not here in Mayberry. No chicken crosses no roads in Mayberry without Deputy Fyfe knowing about it!
Gandalf: O chicken, do not meddle in the affairs of roads, for you are tasty and good with barbecue sauce.
Bill Gates: For the money
Frank Bunker Gilbereth: To minimize its therbligs
Jim Gillis: The chicken crossed the road to show the gophers it could be done.
Newt Gingrich: To get to the RIGHT side of the road.
Newt Gingrich (again): The chicken had to cross the road, because, bogged down by the incredible debt burden, it was no longer able to fly.
Newt Gingrich (III): It was safety pinned to one of those damn punk rockers!
Ira Glasser (ACLU): The chicken maintains an absolute privacy interest in information as to whether or why he or she may have perambulated the thoroughfare.
Johann Wolfgang v. Goethe: The eternal hen-principle made it do it.
Sir Charles Grandiose: As surely as the golden hairs turn to silver, as surely as the sands drift silently through the slender neck of the hourglass, the last sunny days of summer flee soundlessly under autumn's chilly embrace. And with those last days of that warmest and most joyful of seasons, left the road's edge the sprightliest young chicken ever a Baronet did see
Hercules Gryptyppe-Thynne, (All-around Public-School Cad): That's not a chicken! It's a clever disguise, inside of which is Count Jim "Thighs" Moriarity.....
Gary Gygax: Because I rolled a 64 on the "Chicken Random Behaviors" chart on page 497 of the Dungeon Master's Guide.
Hamlet: Because 'tis better to suffer in the mind the slings and arrows of outrageous road maintenance than to take arms against a sea of oncoming vehicles.
Thomas Hardy: The road was black, the sky was white (and so were the feathers) as the bright red mark on the top of the chicken's head gleamed in the twilight. It was a pure chicken and it was doomed.
Mike Harris, (Premier of Ontario): Like evrything else in this province, it was facing the axe.
Paul Harvey: And now... page two... a chicken... attempts to cross... the street... yes... the street... and is... run down by a... Buick! The Buick Roadmaster with it's powerful perfomance and elegant style! Yes... that poor chicken... hit by the Buick... it's true... it's... true... and speaking of true... your local True Value Hardware Store...
Hegel: Only through the synthesis of the dialectical chicken and road could the spirit transcend the experience of crossing.
Robert Heinlein: Because with the freedom the chicken was given, it was the chicken's responsibility to do so.
Robert Heinlein (again): The more widely dispersed chickens are throughout the Universe, the better the long-term prospects for the survival of the chicken species.
Werner Heisenberg: We are not sure which side of the road the chicken was on, but it was moving very fast.
Ernest Hemingway: To die. In the rain.
Hippocrates: Because of an excess of light pink gooey stuff in its pancreas.
Doug Hofstadter: To seek explication of the correspondence between appearance and essence through the mapping of the external road-object onto the internal road-concept.
Sherlock Holmes: It crossed the road because it was going to catch a train at Victoria Station at 3:15, to Edinburgh. And how did I know that? Observe, Watson, the patina of dust on the chicken's feathers, which indicates that it had been spending time in a library, reading about Scotland. And observe also that it was humming "Bonnie Lassie" as it waited to cross. Finally, and most important, observe the train ticket marked Edinburgh, stuffed under one wing, and the fact that Victoria station was where the chicken crossed the street, and finally that the only train to Edinburgh this afternoon is the 3:15....
David Hume: Out of custom and habit.
Saddam Hussein: This was an unprovoked act of rebellion and we were quite justified in dropping 50 tons of nerve gas on it.
Lee Iacocca: It found a better car, which was on the other side of the road.
Dr. Jack Van Impe: Well you see, here's the really exciting part, if we were to look at Revelation 17:3 we will see that the Whore of Babylon rides on a scarlet beast. A scarlet beast! What this means is a Rhode Island Red. And the truly glorious thing is that this beast, this Rhode Island Red, this CHICKEN has crossed the road EXACTLY as was prophesized in the Bible and this is all a sign, Revelation 17:3, that we're living in the End Time. Hallelujah! And if you would like more information on the significance of this chicken crossing the road as all part of God's great plan then send me $50 and you will recieve this set of video tapes along with a copy of my recent book "Chickens: fowl beast, or foul beast?".
John Paul Jones: It has not yet begun to cross!
Carl Jung: The confluence of events in the cultural gesalt necessitated that individual chickens cross roads at this historical juncture, and therefore synchronicitously brought such occurrences into being.
Franz Kafka: Dieter, now in the form of a chicken, was running from the government's torture machine. The machine, an instrument of death, slowly obliterated the souls of its victims. Dieter was alone. He was running for his life, his insignificant life.
Immanuel Kant: The pure transcendental concept of the road, having been deduced a priori and without dependence on intuitions, is given in the mode of the chicken as an end in itself, while crossing the road as a hypothetical imperative, namely, as acting towards some end allowed by Reason.
Casey Kasem: And now here's a hot new number from a hot young band whose drummer was so tragically killed in a freeway accident, it's The Hen House Flock singing "When You Gonna Crow?" hitting the charts at number 23!
JFK: The chicken chose to cross the road in this decade not because it was easy, but because it was hard.
Obi Wan Kenobi: To follow old obi wan on some damn fool idealistic crusade.
Jack Kerouac: The chicken hipster, high on tea and the soul groves of Charlie (the bird) Parker, strolled aimlessly on the road looking for his dharma.
Soren Kierkegaard: The chicken is dead. The road is nothing.
Colonel Kilgore: "I love the smell of chickens in the morning"
Martin Luther King: It had a dream.
James Tiberius Kirk: To boldly go where no chicken has gone before.
Ralph Klein: Because we gave it a one-way bus ticket to B.C.
Mark Knophler: How come Chickens got Industrial Disease?
Mark Lane: There is new, irrefutable evidence that the chicken did not act alone.
Gary Larson: Don't ask me. I am retired. Stan Laurel: I'm sorry, Ollie. It escaped when I opened the run.
Timothy Leary: Because that's the only kind of trip the Establishment would let it take.
John Le Carre: Because it knew, at the core of its being where none could ever reach, that its only course of action now that its cover was blown wide open was to try and slip away into the grey, foggy, bleak evening before Smiley came, accompanied by his silent shadow Peter Guillam, asking questions for which there could never be answers.
Dr. Hannibal Lector: So I could eat its liver, with some fava beans and a nice chianti .......thththththththth.
Leda: Are you sure it wasn't Zeus dressed up as a chicken? He's into that kind of thing, you know.
Foghorn Leghorn: To get to that damn Dawg, Boah!
Gottfried Von Leibniz: In this best possible world, the road was made for it to cross.
Vladimir Lenin: It is not the chicken's road. It is the PEOPLE'S road!
David Letterman: And the No. 1 reason - fricasee!
Rush Limbaugh: Beacuse of those damn bleeding heart liberals, trying to save one stupid bird while thousands of jobs are being lost. Dave Lister: Because of the smegging space corps directives.
Any Late Evening News Anchor: The chicken crosses the road. Film at 11:00.
Abraham Lincoln: Fourscore and seven eggs ago, our forefeathers...
Logan (Law and Order): To buy a plaid tie
Jack London: To answer the call of the wild.
H.P. Lovecraft: To futilely attempt escape from the dark powers which even then pursued it, hungering after the stuff of its soul!
George Lucas: Because the Force was with it.
Machiavelli: So that its subjects will view it with admiration, as a chicken which has the daring and courage to boldly cross the road, but also with fear, for whom among them has the strength to contend with such a paragon of avian virtue? In such a manner is the princely chicken's dominion maintained.
Marvin (the paranoid android): "Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and you ask me why the chicken crossed the road? I could tell you, but I really don't think it's worth while."
Marvin the Paranoid Android: Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and what do they ask me? Why did the chicken cross the road? As if their pathetic cerebelums could even comprehend my answer. Chickens, don't talk to me about chickens... they're SO depressing.
Karl Marx: It was a historical inevitability.
Karl Marx (again): To escape the bourgeois middle-class struggle.
Groucho Marx: Chicken? What's all this talk about chicken? Why, I had an uncle who thought he was a chicken. My aunt almost divorced him, but we needed the eggs.
Groucho Marx (again): This morning I shot a chicken in my pyjamas -- and lemme tell ya, that chicken ran out of my pyjamas in a second!
Jackie Mason: Whaddaya want, it should just stand there?
Perry Mason: Cross the road you say? But how can you be sure? No one else would have known the chicken crossed the road except for the real killer!
Dr. McCoy: How should I know? Damnit Jim, I'm a Doctor not an ornithologist!
Marshall McLuhan: The Road is the Medium. The chicken is the Message!
Gregor Mendel: To get various strains of roads.
A.A. Milne: I imagine that if I thought very hard I shouold come up with a reason. (also applicable to Winnie the Pooh)
John Milton: To justify the ways of God to men.
Indigo Montoya: It too pursues a man with six fingers on his left hand.
Michael Moriarity: To annoy Janet Reno.
Jim Morrison: To break on thruough to the other side, I am the chicken king
Ralph Nader: A chicken on a road is unsafe at any speed
Sir Isaac Newton: Chickens at rest tend to stay at rest. Chickens in motion tend to cross the road.
Jack Nicholson: 'Cause it (censored) wanted to. That's the (censored) reason.
Nietzsche: Because if you gaze too long across the Road, the Road gazes also across you.
Col. Oliver North: I do not recall any such events. I had no knowledge of these occurrences.
Peter Norton: It was a virus and it saw me coming...
Richard Nixon: That part of our conversation was accidentally erased.
George Orwell: Because Big Brother was watching to make sure that it did cross the road, although in its heart, the chicken never did.
Thomas Paine: Out of common sense.
Michael Palin: Nobody expects the banished inky chicken!
Emporer Palpatine: Foolish chicken! Only now, at the end, do you see the head-lights!
Dorothy Parker: Travel, trouble, music, art / A kiss, a frock, a rhyme / The chicken never said they fed its heart / But still they pass its time.
Patsy: Oh, F*&% the chicken. Run it over and lets have a drink.
Gen. George S. Patton: To get those yellow bellied chickens outta here.
General George S. Patton (again): The way to win a war is not to cross a road for you country. The way to win a war is to make some OTHER poor chicken cross a road for HIS COUNTRY!
Wolfgang Pauli: There already was a chicken on the other side of the road.
Frank Perdue: How the heck do I know? Do I look like a chicken to you -- don't answer that.
Marlin Perkins, on Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom: Watch, as the chicken mauls Jim yet again...
H. Ross Perot: I'm crossing. I'm not crossing....
H. Ross Perot2: Crossing the road is that chickens primary concern! PRIMARY concern!
H. Ross Perot3: Chickens and roads, I'll tell ya what it means! It means 4 trillion dollars of dafficit, it means the end of our infrastructure, it means... look at this chart!
H. Ross Perot4: Let me tell ya, it's all about NAFTA. This chicken represents your job, and this road represents the Mexican border...
Jean-Luc Picard: To see what's out there.
Jean-Luc Picard (again): Because it's shields were down and it had no other options left...
Piglet: Because ch-ch-chickens are such very s-s-s-small animals.
Plato: For the greater good.
Edgar Allan Poe: Quoth the chicken,"Nevermore!"
Emily Post: When a chicken is confronted with a road, it is only proper for the chicken to stand erect, turn to face the road, look both ways and cross... remembering to send a sincere thank you letter within one month of the event.
Elvis Presley: You aint nothin' but a chicken, crossin' all the roads!
Psalms: Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no road!
Pyrrho the Skeptic: What Road?
Monty Python: For Something Completely Different
Dan Quayle: "chicken" C-H-I-K-E-N "chicken"
The Red Queen: Who cares? Off with it's head!
R2D2: beep bleep be deep birp whirrrrrrrrr!
The White Rabbit: It was late!
Ayn Rand: The chicken crossed the road in order to get away from the flock that is stifling his creativity.
Ayn Rand (again): If not for the intransigently independent vision of that first chicken, none of the other chickens would have been able to cross the road. And they condemned him for his acheivement!
Ronald Reagan: I don't recall. What was the question?
Georg Friedrich Riemann: The answer appears in Dirichlet's lectures.
Pat Riley: The chicken crossed the lane in less than 3 seconds, so a "fowl" should not have been called.
Rimmer: Aliens!!!
General Jack D. Ripper: To maintain the purity of its precious bodily fluids.
Geraldo Rivera: Stay tuned as a panel of chickens reveals the shocking truth.
Tom Robbins: Well you see, that chicken was a special chicken who was a descendent of a parrot family that once built pyramids for tourist pharohs. This chicken liked the other side of the road whose shamanic whispers beckoned Anastasia, the parrot, like the popped cherry of a ritually consumated white wedding. That's the meaning of it all, baby!
Oral Roberts: He couldn't raise the $10,000,000.00 so God called him home.
Oral Roberts (again): And I said to the chicken: "Put your claw on the screen! Put your claw on the screen, upon the hand of Brother Oral, and you shall be healed. Make a love offering of $50 or more, and then touch the screen. And that chicken did put his claw on the screen. And the power of God, in his infinite wisdom and mercy, flowed through me and out through that television set, and that chicken was healed *PRAISE GOD!*. And then that chicken, stricken for so many months, rose up and walked across the road. But, since he had forgotten his love offering, God never warned him about the 30 ton semi barreling down on the crosswalk...."
Carl Sagan: To see the billions and billions of stars.
Col. Saunders: It Ran, Suh! I offered it a coating of 11 herbs and spices and it ran, Suh! So I shot it, Suh, shot it while it was trying to escape, suh!
Sappho: For the touch of your skin, the sweetness of your lips..
Jean-Paul Sartre: In order to act in good faith and be true to itself, the chicken found it necessary to cross the road.
Arnold Schwarzenegger: It was going back...
Mr. Scott: 'Cos ma wee transporter beam was na functioning properly. Ah canna work miracles, Captain, wi' no dilithium crystals left to speak of!
Agent Scully: There simply must be a rational, scientific explanation. Chickens don't just "cross roads"
Neddy Seagoon: WhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatwhatWHAT?
William Shakespeare:
1: This is the road of chicken's discontent, Made ignoble abbatoir by this half-ton truck... (Richard II)
2: Bring me no more reports, let them fly all; 'Til a chicken remove to other side of road I cannot taint with fear. What is this chicken? Was he not born of hen? The spirits that know All fowl consequences have pronounced me thus: "Fear not, MacNugget; no chicken that's born of hen Shall e'er lay beak upon thee." (Macbeth)
3: If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well It were done quickly: if the crossing Could scoot across the dotted line, and catch, Beyond passing car, sidewalk; that but these feathers Might be the be-all and end-all here, But here, at this corner of street and avenue, We'd cross at the light to come. (Macbeth)
4: To cross, or not to cross? That is the question, Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The wheels and axles of the city's mass transit Or to take flight against a sea of motorists And by opposing, end me? To cross, to peep No more! And by that peep to say we end The chickhood and the thousand fender-shocks That chicken is heir to. 'Tis a perambulation Devoutly to be wish'd. (Hamlet)
Homer Simpson: ohhhhhhhh Chicken.....
Bart Simpson: It's outta here, man!
Mrs. Slocum: Now look what you've done, there's chicken all over my pussy!
Kenneth Starr: In view of President Clinton's dealings with the Tyson Poultry Company, the matter of the chicken crossing the road is under investigation for its possible connection with the Whitewater affair.
George Steinbrenner: Because I offered him a $4 million contract.
George Steinbrenner2: Because I fired him!
George Steinbrenner3: Because he's now my new manager.
George Steinbrenner4: Because I fired him again!
Dr. Suess: See the end of this document for the full Dr. Suess version.
Sisyphus: Was it pushing a rock, too?
B.F. Skinner: Because the external influences which had pervaded its sensorium from birth had caused it to develop in such a fashion that it would tend to cross roads, even while believing these actions to be of its own free will.
Mr. Spock: It was not logical for the chicken to do so, but I have frequently observed that the behaviour of chickens is not logical
E.E. (Doc) Smith: Your humble narrator can barely do justice to this climactic event that rent asunder the fundamental ether of space itself, as the chicken, embodying all that is good and hard and straight and keen in the Avain world, fearlessly approached, bridged, and conquered the road for Civilization.
Socrates: To pick up some hemlock at the corner druggist.
The Sphinx: You tell me.
Joseph Stalin: It was clearly a conspiracy. Take all the chickens out and shoot them. At Once!
John Steinbeck: The road baked in the relentless summer sun as the chicken, looking about, began to cross. It stopped occaisionally to peck at a grass seed that had become lodged in a crevice in the cracked macadam. The chicken reached the other side, then began making his way to the Salinas, which lay muddy and turgid in the July afternoon, all the while thinking of the cool shade by the river and how good the can of beans in his bedroll would taste tonight.
Ben Stone (Law and Order): Because the defendant made it, sir.
Oliver Stone: He went back, and to the left. Back, and to the left. Back, and to the left. Back, and to the left. Back, and to the left. Back, and to the..
Dr. Strangelove: Because it could not afford to be caught on the wrong side of the road-side gap.
John Sununu: The Air Force was only too happy to provide the transportation, so quite understandably the chicken availed himself of the opportunity.
Grand Moff Tarkin: Fear will keep the chickens in line, fear of this thoroughfare!
Tim "The Toolman" Taylor: This here bird'll cross that road in no time flat, now that I've made a few "special modifications! We've added the Binford 7100 Multi-Purpose power unit, which I've souped up by adding a United Aircraft PT-6 jet engine - Urrgh urrgh urrgh! Heidi, bring out the chicken, please....
Alfred, Lord Tennyson: So that it could sail beyond the sunset.
Old Testament: And rooster and hen were married. And rooster did begat chicken. And chicken did cross the road.
New Testament: He among you who has not crossed roads, let him cast the first egg!
Margaret Thatcher: There was simply no alternative!
Theodoric of York, the Medievil Barber: Because of an imbalance of bodily humors caused by an elf or small toad living in the chicken's stomach. What this fowl needs is a good bleeding. Dylan Thomas: To not go (sic) gentle into that good night.
Hunter S. Thompson: Why the &*%$#@ not?
Henry David Thoreau: To live deliberately ... and suck all the marrow out of life.
Tiggr: Because that's what chickens do best!
Tiggr: (again) That's the wonderful thing about Chickens, Chasing Chickens is FUN FUN FUN, And the Wonderful thing about Chickens Is that when crossing streets they RUN!
Tim, the Enchanter: It's got wings that... and a beak that... good god man, look at the bones!
Brian Tobin (new premier of Newfoundland): It followed the cod....
J.R.R. Tolkein: The chicken, sunlight coruscating off its radiant yellow- white coat of feathers, approached the dark, sullen asphalt road and scrutinized it intently with its obsidian-black eyes. Every detail of the thoroughfare leapt into blinding focus: the rough texture of the surface, over which count- less tires had worked their relentless tread through the ages; the innumerable fragments of stone embedded within the lugubrious mass, perhaps quarried from the great pits where the Sons of Man labored not far from here; the dull black asphalt itself, exuding those waves of heat which distort the sight and bring weakness to the body; the other attributes of the great highway too numerous to give name.
Thomas de Torquemada: Give me ten minutes with the chicken and I'll find out.
Anthony Trollope: Why, to avoid Mrs. Proudy and Mr. Slope, of course.
Mark Twain: The news of its crossing has been greatly exaggerated.
Darth Vader: Because it could not resist the power of the Dark Side.
George Washington: I cannot tell a lie. I was going to chop it with my little axe, so it crossed the road.
Mae West: 'Cause I invited it to come up and see me sometime.
Jerry White: Why does a chicken cross the road only half-way? So she can lay it on the line.
Walt Whitman: To cluck the song of itself.
Robert Anton Wilson: Because agents of the Ancient Illuminated Roosters of Cooperia were controlling it with their Orbital Mind-Control Lasers as part of their master plan to take over the world's egg production.
Major Charles Emerson Winchester, the Third: What do you two-bit quacks know about chickens? Did you learn about them in medical school, or did you just read the comic book?
Ludwig Wittgenstein: The possibility of "crossing" was encoded into the objects "chicken" and "road," and circumstances came into being which caused the actualization of this potential occurrence.
Wittgenstein #2: There are indeed things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. They are what is mystical.
Wittgenstein #3: What we cannot explain we must pass over in silence.
Tom Wolfe: Kesey, muscles rippling under his shirt, a mysterious smile on his face, surrounded by the Merry Pranksters, placed the chicken at the road's edge. The chicken paused at the edge of the road, looking this way and that, and then rending the air with a tremendous, "ba-BAAWWWWKKK!" bolted across the road, its disheveled wings flapping uselessly about, leaving a trail of feathers and dander that, whenever two-ton chromium steel, 300 horsepower tail-finned symbols of Detroit's and America's supremacy passed, would swirl in a miniature version of a cyclone like the ones Mr. and Mrs. America see on the TV news every evening when he's come home from work and she's setting the table for dinner, both only half paying attention to the cyclones that devastate midwestern cow towns on sweltering summer afternoons. And the heat, dander, tornados, asphalt, tail-fins and the sweat of Mr. and Mrs. America as they move mechanically in their daily routine like the figurines in one of those huge medieval clocks on some cathedral in some European town, moving in the same way, every hour on the hour, it was all summed up by the "ba-BAAWWWWKKK!" of a scampering chicken accompanied by the "skritch, skritch" of its feet.
William Wordsworth: To have something to recollect in tranquility.
Mr. Worf: I do not know, Klingon chickens do NOT cross the road.
Molly Yard: It was a hen!
Yoda: Crossing the road makes not a chicken great
Henny Youngman: Take this chicken ... please.
Zeno of Elea: To prove it could never reach the other side.
STAR TREK CHICKENS CROSS THE ROAD TOO
Chakotay: Whatever its reason, whatever its goals, we should respect its right to cross the road and seek its own spiritual awareness.
Neelix: Actually, Captain, I'm not really familiar with the chickens in this system. But--if you can catch it, I can cook it.
Riker: I don't know why, but I do know how: with pleasure, sir.
Garak: To get to the other side? Of course not! Do you realize how ridiculous that is? I'm sure it was a simple matter of its farmer expelling it from the coop for...embezzling eggs.
Odo: I don't have the slightest idea--and I don't particularly care...but then, I've never understood you ornithoids' need to engage in such pointless behavior.
Quark: Now really, why would I have bribed him to do it so I could make a tidy profit in the station pool? Besides, all I know is that chicken tastes just like tube grubs.
Q: Wouldn't you like to know? Too bad your puny human brain wouldn't be able to comprehend the answer.
O'Brien: Well, it's nothing a good pint or two won't fix.
Uhura: Shall I open hailing frequencies so you can ask it, sir?
V'Ger: To join with the Creator.
Sulu: To get back to San Franciso; it was born there.
Troi: It was running...running away from...no, escaping...oh, Captain, it was fleeing from such -pain-!
Kira: I bet those damn Cardassians were after it!
Picard: Dammit, that's not for us to answer! It's his fundamental right as a sentient being to determine the time and manner by which he travels towards his goals!
Dr. Bashir: I suppose it wanted to play some darts.
The Grand Nagus: Stupid chicken! You don't cross the road all at once! You sneak across it quietly, without anyone noticing! (Inconceivable!)
Sisko: I don't care -why- it was crossing the road! All I want to know is -why- it left the coop! So it wanted to "get to the other side"--there is only -so far- that my tolerance will go!
Barclay: Uh, chicken?!! Where?!!! C-c-c-ommander, did I ever mention my problem with small feathered things?
Gul Dukat: Well, that's a very interesting question...I'm sure we can work out some kind of arrangement to obtain that information that will be to everyone's satisfaction.
The Borg: Crossing the road is irrelevant. It will be assimilated.
Hugh the Borg: Maybe it wanted to be my friend.
Geordi: Well, wherever it's going, I'm sure it'll be there in an hour or two--but any later, and it'll be absolutely impossible for it to make it.
Jake: To check out the babe that just came off that transport!
Gene Roddenberry: To boldly go where no chicken had gone before.
Kes: It was remembering back to the times when its ancestors crossed roads all the time! They lost those abilities because they stopped using them!
Wesley: I'm not sure, but I can figure it out if I reroute these systems and reconfigure the warp field and run a complete internal whootchacallit on the computers and...
B'Elanna: I'm sure it felt suffocated by all the [BEEP] regulations of [BEEP] Starfleet and just couldn't stand it any longer!
Worf: I don't know. KLINGON chickens do NOT cross roads.
Spock: Fasincating, Captain, it seems driven by a beam of pure energy.
HoloDoc: How should I know? No one tells me anything around here! I didn't even know we added chickens to the crew! All I know is that it would have been nice, BEFORE the chicken went off to the cross the road, if it had remembered to turn me off!
Data: The chicken, in observing that it was on the opposite side of the 20th century Terran paved roadway, was aware that its immediate goal should have been to traverse the distance without interception by an kind of combustion-propelled personal transport vehicle, but I am unclear as to why any kind of domesticated fowl should desire to perambulate upon a conveyance normally reserved for the usage of...yes, sir.
Sarek: Sometimes my logic fails me where chickens are concerned.
Dax: To get to the other side. Kurzon might have disagreed with me, Tobin I'm sure wouldn't have had a clue,and then there's...
Tuvok: That's not a question we'd prefer to hear from a senior officer. It makes the junior officers nervous.
Dr. Crusher: Maybe since he couldn't make the other side to get to him, -he- had to get to the other side....
Dr. Soran: His heart just wasn't in it. (Scenes of chicken torture with nanoprobes have been edited out.)
Scotty: Because she couldna take much morrrrrre.
Charlie X: Because it didn't want to STAY...STAY...STAY...
Kirk: You chicken bastard, you killed my son...YOU chicken BASTARD, you killed...my SON...you CHICKEN bastard....youkilledmy...son!
Bones: Dammit, I'm a doctor, not an ornithologist!
Tasha: That depends...was it fully functional?
Chekov: It must have been on its way to assist in saving my life for the billionth time..did I scream this time?
Khan: With my last breath I spit at the chicken...
Harry: I don't know, it's my first mission.
Paris: Well, I think that...say, that's a lovely shirt you're wearing.
Harvey Mudd: Chicken? I don't remember any chicken. No no no, there's been a terrible misunderstanding.
Crewman in red suit: "Captain, this chicken seems to have crossed the AAARRRGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!"
Nurse Chapel: Oh, Spock, I fixed you your favorite Vulcan plomeek and chicken soup!
Lwaxana: Oh, Jean-Luc!
Janeway: Its primary goal was no doubt to get back to the Alpha Quadrant...and it probably misses its dog.
Dr. Suess:
Would you, could you cross the street On your two small chicken feet?
I would not, could not cross the street On my two small chicken feet. Across the road I will not scram Even though a fowl I am.
Would you cross it in Japan To flee Godzilla and Rodan
Not in Japan Godzilla and Rodan I would not, could not cross the street On my two small chicken feet. Across the road I will not scram Even though a fowl I am.
Would you cross the road and cluck And jump to avoid the speeding truck?
Not with a cluck to avoid a truck Not in Japan Godzilla and Rodan I would not, could not cross the street On my two small chicken feet Across the road I will not scram Even though a fowl I am.
Would you hop across the road As though you were a garden toad?
Not across the road as though a toad Not with a cluck to avoid a truck Not in Japan Godzilla and Rodan I would not could not cross the street On my two small chicken feet. Across the road I will not scram Even though a fowl I am.
Would you cross it in the night Lit by passing car headlight?
Not in the night With car headlight Not across the road As though a toad Not with a cluck To avoid a truck Not in Japan Godzilla and Rodan I would not could not cross the street On my two small chicken feet. Across the road I will not scram Even though a fowl I am.
Please dear chicken give it a try For across the road you can not fly.
Alright! Alright! I'll give it a try For it is true, chickens can't fly. Hey! It's not bad, infact it's neat! I truly love to cross the street. Across the road I LOVE to scram. I cross the road, a fowl I am.
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mittensmorgul · 5 years
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last episode of the loop today: 2.12 Nightshifter.
Heck I love this one. I forgot to mention in the 2.11 post how their style of talking to potential victims of the supernatural has evolved... they just ask "Do you want the truth?" and when Susan says of course she does, they just... lay it on the line for her, hoodoo, spirits, all of it. Which is FASCINATING because one episode later when confronted with having to tell another witness the truth when he's already so close to figuring it all out for himself (and in fact was effectively right even if he hit on the wrong genre, with robots instead of shapeshifter monsters, he'd worked out all the other pieces of the big puzzle for himself, including that the thing moved around underground), Sam... lies through his teeth. And it ends up directly leading to Ronald's death.
Sam had been trying to protect someone, to move an easy win into his Points Accrued Against Destiny, in the cosmic tally he believed would help him change his destiny from inevitably turning evil, and instead the very act of trying to protect him (by trying to convince him he was wrong and honestly insane to believe in the evidence of his own eyes to the contrary) ended up leading directly to his death. Sam seriously underestimated what Ronald would do, taking matters into his own hands when he thought nobody else believed him, all in the name of clearing his friend of a robbery he KNOWS he didn't commit. And uncovering the Mandroid Conspiracy he thought was lurking in the shadows...
Also this kinda works as another point in the "even if we put it on youtube, nobody would believe us, and if they DID believe us, they'd get themselves killed trying to take action on their own anyway" column they finally addressed in plain terms in 14.16 with the Sheriff there.
Not telling Ronald the truth also lost them their only weapon against the shapeshifter, when Ronald tossed Dean's silver knife. He went in completely unprepared for what he was going to face, not realizing what his actions would look like to the outside world-- running into a bank armed with guns and holding everyone hostage. It wasn't ever really a feasible plan.
And once again, it outs Sam and Dean to the larger law enforcement community and drives them even deeper underground, hampering their ability to do their jobs going forward for a very long time to come. Because in his rush to protect Ronald from the truth, he assumed just telling him he was wrong would actually be enough to stop him from interfering. He had more than enough information to prompt him to act, and yet far less than enough information to make him think twice about actually doing it...
Even the structure of the episode itself fits into this "it's not what it looks like on the surface" theme. We start the cold open with blasts from the past, and then it seems like the episode is cutting away to a breaking news alert... except the alert is part of the episode, showing what appears to be Dean involved in a bank robbery on the evening news. TITLE CARD. And then we go back to see how they got to that point, going through the investigation where they're playing FBI agents and Dean's getting hit on by the woman he was supposed to be interviewing.
ETA: It’s also amusing how the monster in this case poses as its own victim in an attempt to get Sam and Dean to kill an innocent human being in its place, literally “playing dead” with the fake cut to its throat and everything. Except Sam and Dean don’t just kill her human counterpart-- they bring her in to see her “victim” who is actually the shapeshifter, which logically freaks her right tf out, to the point she faints dead away. Which makes Sam and Dean question the facts vs their perceptions yet again, and the shifter is forced to out itself...
(I’m still wondering how the cops explained the dead woman with the flesh peeling off her when the same woman was also still very obviously not dead... Schrodinger’s Bank Robbery Victim?)
But I've already talked about all of this before... just look through my tag for this episode for tons of essays on all of this. I'mma just watch the rest of the episode and enjoy it :D
(oh, one last thing... after they kill the monster, the one who peels off its old skin to reveal different skin beneath, Sam and Dean sneak out of the bank in stolen SWAT uniforms, leaving their stripped counterparts they stole those “skins” from unconscious in a closet inside. Thus begins another round of Winchesters having to stay off the radar in a more extreme way than their typical MO for regular hunting. This is being pushed from outside forces, too, just like every other level of the narrative’s concurrent escalations. It’s almost like the more they fight for their own free will, for the chance to determine their own fate, the more fate pushes back against them, and they’re unwittingly choosing it every time, because of the way the choices are set up for them in the first place...)
I wrote this after 14.16:
https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/183687723240/ive-just-seen-your-post-about-nottelling-people
and this back in 2017 (with help from lizbob) about how Ronald was right but applying the wrong genre filter to what he'd learned, aka that one I used a cracker jack box as a metaphor for the spiral narrative and reading the meta subtext:
https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/165087210615/mandroids-meta-and-subtext
Ronald vs genre savvy: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/158968260870/212-ronald-resnicks-only-problem-was-a-lack-of
and this one from s12 about lies, being lied to, the power of the truth, and the rashomon effect: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/158260971600/i-like-this-better-it-feels-nice-i-hate-when
Ain’t it thrilling when the small scale of the narrative reflects the manipulation and deception of the grandest scale of the narrative?
happy reading :'D
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bennguinfest · 6 years
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Spring 2019 Fan Fest Prompt List
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Hey fan-festers! 
We’re happy to say that we received 81 prompts this time around, and we spent the last few days distilling all those amazing and creative prompts down to a list of 63 prompts! (If you’re keeping count, that’s far more than last year’s 48!) 
As with last year, we had some repeat prompts and prompts that were similar enough that it made sense to condense them under one item. Additionally, most of the prompts we distilled down to a few words for the sake of having a concise list! Again, like last year’s fest, we’re providing the full text of the original prompts under the cut, in case you’re looking for more details to get started!
You’re free to create any kind of fanwork based on the below prompts! There’s no minimum word count and no rules on what to create, or even how many - if you want to combine prompts, that’s cool! If you’re called to make more than one thing, that’s awesome too! The only limit is that this fest runs from now until April 15th - so if you’re creating something, make sure you post it and tag it with #bennguinfanfest so we can share it to this tumblr! If you’re posting to AO3, the collection is now open for submissions as well, so make sure to include your work there so everyone can find it!
One final thing: even if you didn’t submit prompts, feel free to participate and join us on the discord! We’ve set up a discord server here: bennguinfest on discord to stay connected, inspire each other, and have fun! It’s a great group and really active, so don’t be shy!
That’s it! On to the prompt list!
Matchmaking dogs
Space AU
Birthday gifts
Coming out/being together in the NHL
Acting like a couple (but they’re not actually a couple)
Tyler as a WAG
Transported to a parallel universe
Abducted by aliens
Superhero/Superpowers AU
Amnesia from an injury
Soulmate AUs: Color-based, name-on-wrist
Thirst follow/Met online
Drag AU
Time loops
Alternate histories
Cop AU
Reality show AU (Survivor, the Bachelor, Married At First Sight)
Jamie Poppins/Single dad AU
Supernatural races (vampires, werewolves, shapeshifters, etc.)
Omegaverse: Courting
Delivery boy/Uber driver AU
Tyler gets traded back to Boston
Breaking up & making up
Omegaverse: Bonding drama
Boring office desk job
Road trips
Protective Jamie defending Tyler
College/University AU
Tyler tries to be Jamie’s wingman
Lites’s comments affecting the boys
Taking care of a sick hockey player
Cuddle pile/team bed fic
Harry Potter AU
Fire alarm meet-cute
DnD/Hockey Mashup
De-aged after a fight
Bakery/Tattoo Artist AU
Friends with benefits - and then with feelings
Zombie AU
Homeless AU
Nerds are hot/competency kink
Omegaverse: scents
YouTube channel AU
Bridal shop meet-cute
Beard appreciation
Tornado warning
Figure skater mpreg
Self-conscious Jamie
Wing!fic
Winning the cup and a kiss on the ice
Lifeguard AU
Haunted farm
Animal daemons
Surprise/sudden parenting
Jealousy from dating/flirting with someone else
Secret relationship and almost getting caught
Long-lost childhood friends
"Come here."
“Close the door.”
“I feel like I can’t breathe.”
“It’s three in the morning and you want me to do what?”
“You could’ve died.”
“I thought you were dead.
Full text of the prompts under the link! If you have any questions, feel free to send us an ask - and as always, happy creating! 
1. Matchmaking dogs: Tyler’s dogs want to get their human with a certain cow-eyed captain
“well this is really awkward considering the last time we saw each other, i was screaming at you to never talk to me again, but like, my dog recognized you all the way across the park and literally dragged me over here because she misses you so hi” AU
2. Space AU (ex. Star Trek, Firefly, or something else entirely)
3. It's Tyler's birthday and at first Jamie gives off the feeling that he's forgotten and this hurts Tyler but it turns out that that Jamie wakes Tyler up at midnight on his birthday with two tickets to an offseason trip
4. I want a fic that REALLY captures what it would be like if two NHL players were to come out in 2019. I'm talking teammate reactions, press reactions, social media, family, the whole shebang. I wanna see the real raw reactions and the struggle the guys would have to go through. I would also loooove if you could fit Jamie proposing to Tyler in there somewhere but it isn't a necessity.
Jamie has a hard time dealing with how public Tyler’s life is, with the insta stories and with random people filming him all the time. It feels like it’s only a matter of time before their relationship is exposed because of how much Tyler is in the public eye. Jamie doesn’t want to break up but it seems like that’s the only choice he has. He doesn’t want to do this so much that he calls a press conference and comes out of the closet.
Jamie and Tyler have been dating since 2014 and he’s tired of hiding it. So with Jamie’s consent he posts a cute photo of them being a couple and writes a heartfelt monologue about their story. And the whole hockey community blows up about it. And it’s kinda about how they deal with being and out couple and Tyler posting obnoxiously cute couple photos on his Instagram. Sorry this prompted is a mess I just want Tyler to be a troll and post cute cliche couple photos on Instagram of him and Jamie and the world loading their minds about it.
Jamie and Tyler come out to the team about them dating. Management wants to keep their relationship secret so they make Jamie fake date someone. And him and Tyler struggle with the stress that puts on them.
realistic consequences of being together with the team
5. Tyler and Jamie are super close but super oblivious to the fact that they act like a literal couple. Jamie has a gf and she hates the fact that it seems like Jamie cares more about Tyler than he does her.
6. Fluffy fic where Jamie still plays hockey, he meets tyler and they fall in love and tyler becomes an nhl wife/husband/boyfriend.
7. Parallel universes -- somehow Tyler (or Jamie) finds himself in an alternate universe where his life is radically different (for better or for worse) which makes him realize how much his relationship to Jamie (or Tyler) means.
waking up in the future/alternate reality fic
8. Jamie and Tyler are abducted by aliens and taken to a faraway planet where they are prisoners in a bizarro planet. Is it real or is it a nightmare though?
9. jamie and tyler are in danger and major trouble when their identities as superheroes are revealed and bad guys are after them.
powers/mutant AU (as in pick one, not all at the same time) One hides their ability from the other, and when the other finds out, its...not good
Superhero AU! Are they superhero partners? Is one of them a superhero and can't date the other because he has to keep him safe? Are they both trying to keep their secret identities secret from each other while simultaneously dating in both iterations? Up to you, or anything else!
10. Amnesia angst for the win - Jamie gets a particularly hard hit, wakes up and can remember everyone except for tyler (maybe not explicitly, say they can *remember* them, but not remember that they've been dating for eight months now) cue tyler avoiding jamie because its too hard him to be around him
11. soulmate au! people are born with blackmarks - on their hands, their faces, their skin in general - the black marks is the first place their soulmate would touch them. Jamie was born without a mark. Tyler was born with two pitch black palms. Years after tylers been traded to the stars, Jamie falls asleep, and tyler can't help but run his fingers through Jamie's hair, just once, and then he looks down at his hand and the tips of his fingers are colored, and so are the few strands of Jamie's black hair.
Soulmate au- either abo or name on wrist. No drama, just fluff!
12. Tyler thirst follows Jamie on insta. This can be hockey or non-hockey, but Jamie follows back and they start talking.
13. Rupaul’s Drag Race au. Tyler and Jamie are competing against each other but are constantly talking about how much they like each other/are attracted to each other in the confessional. They’re both single, so why not go for it? Alternatively, one is a queen and the other is a member of the pit crew.
14. groundhog day au (aka, tylers/jamies day keeps getting reset, again and again until they get together finally and wake up the next day)
15. alternate history, tyler is never traded to dallas, but they still somehow meet and fall in love anyway
16. cop AU, where in tyler the rookie transfers and get stuck with Jamie the sorta senior to show him the ropes. Jamie gets attached. And that’s...a problem, in their line of work. Or at least it is for him.
17. Survivor au- same or different tribe, as long as they’re the “showmance”
"The Bachelor" AU
Married at first sight au- either within the parameters of the actual show, or they literally get married the day they meet
18. Jamie!Poppins - tyler is a single father with a new baby and no clue of what he's going to do. enter Jamie Poppins!
19. Minotaur Jamie
The Dallas Stars are a pack of werewolves, and Tyler is the vampire that’s been traded to their team.
Shifter verse!! and ive got nothing else for this other than wanting to see tyler as a tiny lab puppy pls and thanks
20. Alpha Tyler and omega Jamie: “usually when I meet an omega I wanna bone, but with Jamie I wanna fucking hold his hand and feed him bonbons all day, what the fuck”
21. Jamie the delivery boy. Kay hear me out. Like he keeps delivering huge quantities of food to this particular house and it always seems like there should be more than one person. But there’s not. And Tyler orders. All. The. Time. Hopeful it’s jamie. But they’re both too dumb to ask each other out. Lots of pining
Uber driver! Jamie picks up Tyler from a one night stand
22. Tyler gets traded back to Boston AU - Everything hurts and nothing is okay. (except that at least one of them is retiring at the end of the season so it's actually more okay than they think) (also a future fic)
23. breakup and makeup but spanning over seasons - no cheese plots
24. Bond drama (abo) either they bond too quickly, like at the all star game or something and dont know ehat to do because theyre on different teams, or they really want to bond and its not happening as fast as they think it should
25. Boring office desk job
26. road trip to Montreal to visit Jordie
27. while out chilling at a bar celebrating a win, jamie and tyler are having a couple of drinks and when jamie gets up to go the bathroom, a drunk stranger and a couple of his friends decide to harass Tyler, upsetting him. A furiously protective Jamie intervenes and despite holding his own, Jamie is beaten up and him and tyler end up in a dumpster.
28. A University fic where Tyler is out and proud and gay and Jamie is still trying to figure out his sexuality but he's having a hard time. No homophobic Jamie tho please, just a guy trying to figure himself out. Would love if he would rely on his family throughout the fic for advice.
I’m always a sucker for college au, or masters/PhD students etc
COLLEGE AU BECAUSE WE ALL NEED MORE OF THAT IN OUR LIVES
'the cops showed up to a party we were at and chased everyone away. You and I happened to run in the opposite direction of all our friends and got lost in some dark and creepy street.’ - College AU
29. Tyler finds out Jamie is gay (outed/comes out/whatever you prefer) and embarks on a wild but good-intentioned quest to find Jamie his perfect man.
30. Tyler is hurt by Lites' comments more than one thinks and Jamie is worried when he sees Tyler crying in private.
31. sickfic? jamie taking care of tyler is- like just how pathetic is a sick hockey player?
32. team bed au omg someone pls
33. Harry Potter au but not as high school student, just something in the magical world
34. "3am and the fire alarm in our apartment building went off and you look cold here is my jacket"
35. Hockey AU but they’re all dnd races. I would love to see half-orc Jamie, and goliath Bishop, and tiefling Tyler. Please be as creative as you want with this!
Hockey AU where instead of going out, a core group of guys plays dnd in their hotel rooms while on the road. Tyler and Jamie’s characters are getting flirty in game, and it’s starting to translate outside of it as well.
36. Tyler and jamie fight - a *big* fight, and the next day Jamie suddenly got a deaged tyler on his hands and no idea how to fix it
37. Jamie owns a bakery and tylers the new tat artist next door plsplspls gimme that slow burn bullshit with this one
38. ty/jam used to have a whole friends w benefits thing that went oh-so-wrong because one (or both of them) caught feelings—as one does—and the fic is kind of that aftermath and trying to repair the broken relationship.
39. ZOMBIES
40. Homeless AU w/tyler
41. Tyler is smarter than he leads people to believe, and Jamie is into privately nerdy Tyler
42. Abo verse surrounding scents. Tyler smells like the most delicious thing Jamie has ever smelled, but he thinks he shouldn’t bond with a teammate
43. Youtube channel
44. Designer and single friend of client at a bridal shop AU
45. Beard appreciation
46. a tornado warning hits dallas and everybody is ordered to seek shelter. jamie follows tyler back to his house and hide in the basement with the dogs, frantic and terrified.
47. Tyler is a figure skater, Jamie still plays hockey. They meet and fall inlove but whoops tyler ends up pregnant. The world still isn't 100% accepting of LGBTQIA+ people and even less accepting of men getting pregnant. Tyler feels down at some point cause he has to put his career on hold. but it all ends up great in the end.
48. Jamie feels self-conscious about his ass after some chirping from opposing players and it's up to Tyler to comfort him
49. Wing!fic
50. They win the Stanley cup and kiss at centre ice
51. Jamie's a lifeguard. They meet after Tyler basically drowns himself. (It's not an excuse to have Jamie kiss him. Its *not*.)
52. Haunted farm au- Tyler is a witch that lives on a farm where extremely weird things happen. He ends up rescuing Jamie and Jamie pledges his services for one year in exchange for his life. During that year, they fall for each other hard, but there are outside forces in the farm trying to keep them apart.
53. Animal daemons
Goose daemons
54. Marshall, Cash and Gerry turn into human kids (temporarily or not), Bennguin handle being sudden parents
55. Tyler having a serious boyfriend for a while and Jamie is jealous because he wants to date Tyler but he’s not ready to come out. And he’s also upset because everyone is taking it so well and nothing has changed and he realizes he really missed out. But in the end they still get together.
56. secret relationship and how they almost get caught - many many times
57. Childhood pen pal / long distance childhood friends?
58. "Come here."
59. “Close the door.”
60. “I feel like I can’t breathe.”
61. “It’s three in the morning and you want me to do what?”
62. “You could’ve died.”
63. “I thought you were dead.”
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survivorkalokairi · 6 years
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Episode 1: “How do I bond with people” - Mitch
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Dylan C
https://youtu.be/MiBLiRlSzFc
Stephen
It’s round one and I’ve already learnt a foreign word for pee, this seasons gonna be great
Cam
hello everyone and welcome to HOLY FUCK by cameron, your local certified sick kid
so first of all
I HAVE DYLAN AND MATT SUMMERS AND MITCH ON MY TRIBE
which is all fine and dandy
ABBEY IS ON? THE OTHER TRIBE?
which is also fine and dandy
blake is super sweet and i adore this newbie already!! he's like "im so overwhelmed im in two games"....... sweetie
BUT ALSO
so i message jay to idol hunt
"first in line"
i say "this is door 9 all over again!"
i wait about 15 minutes
go through the path, dee dee dee dee dee
"fountain or pay an offering to the statue" 
me, in my hellenic witchcraft practices, knowing the goddesses really like offerings, gonna offer aphrodite some food (sorry hera)
guess what aphrodite gives me?
an idol. she gives me an idol. i'm truly blessed. this is ridiculous. i got the idol the very first idol hunt of the season.
i'm shaking.
Dylan C
oh my god how to I play a game with my close friends sksjsh (i’ll make a Proper confessional later)
Brittany
i've been doing duolingo for, like, an hour now and there are so many ways to say the. i've counted around 4. it's pretty fun though, and everyone on my tribe seems really cool and nice cx
Zabbey
Wow ok so my tribe is really cute and wholesome so far. I'm playing with JG, Timmy and Stephen which is cool bc i lowkey know them all but I've never played with them so thats fun! I cant really speak on the newbies since I havent really talked to any of them yet but I'm excited to get to know them! It's wild knowing cam and dylan are on the other tribe, I hope i get to play with them too! 
Stephen
Cal is the best, i would love to work with Cal, JG, Timmy, and Zabbey. But i’m still gonna gove the other new guys a chance, still very early days to start making alliances. That being said I’m still very happy we have had a majority on a call, make some ties. *glares at atomic “all-stars”*
Zach
So uh...so far nothing. Unless I’m completely out of the loop. I really like my tribe mate Zabbey. She seems cool and we have the same sense of humor. I really hope to align with her, but we’ll see how it goes. I also really admire Maynor for volunteering to sit since he has to work today. So far I think our tribe vines well. No tea to spill yet, but I’m sure there’s more to come.
Alex
Many people werre talking about drag race and I've never seen it and I kinda knew this would happen to me at some point in mylife when I end up being the bad gay who hates Lady Gaga and hasn't seen drag race and we're here folks.  lol I guess I'll stay quiet and hopefully noone will find out 
J.G.
Night one was, interesting to say the least. I was a little worried because I knew that I had to work during the first hour of the game and with new people I did not want to miss out on the bonding opportunities. Shockingly few were active among the noobies mostly Zach and Cal. The vets on my tribe, I actually know which is wild. Stephen and I have played together in the past, not together but there is for sure no bad feelings, that I know of. Abbey and Timmy I have never played with them but I know of them from the community. I have always wanted to play with them and excited for this opportunity. I know from a viewer this will come off as boring but I do feel that sticking with the vets is going to be smart at least in the early stages but mark my words, if I have any say, Abbey will be the last boot before merge. There is no way hell, I am letting her get any where near merge, I am not dumb no what she can do. Sorry Abbey, you're queen but the queen is not gonna stay queen. I really want to make a three tight alliance with Stephen and Timmy and ride with them but they could always tip off Abbey and use it to their advantage so I need to just chill and let things play out. I feel that if we are to go to tribal in the early stages, I can picture two noobs being easily targeted for inactivity. Oh, let's also talk about how I got freaking 20% disadvantage night one like I always do, and then turn around to get a 10% advantage the next day. I'm mess but I'm gonna keep eating these grapes because they're pretty good.
JG
So I was really sure I was going to be in the first alliance of the season amongst the vets but nope that didn't happen. I am in a unprecedented alliance with Abbey, yeah the person I said I want to make sure gets out before merge and Zach. Our alliance is called Two Gays and a Bi-by ... iconic as fuck. With a smaller tribe starting size with 8, smaller alliances are key plus I feel that we can easily pull some side votes for numbers to honestly keep our alliance alive and active. This makes targeting Abbey really hard cause it could turn Zach against me. I will have to be very cautious, how I go about this. I also talked to Cal and was making sure I connected with him cause I know he was putting work in on Timmy and Stephen last night. That is something I will have to monitor. That can not be allowed to happen. I think working with Timmy would be fun and cool but it's looking like that if after a early not so active noob goes and we need to find another target, I think Timmy would be a fine first threat to knock out leaving Stephen and Cal up in the air.
Cal
Lots of stuff! I was late to the party at the intro but got to chat with Timmy, JG, and Stephen. I learned about their past in the community as well as talked about the many moods of trying to learn greek. One such mood is probably me always confusing the "pi" sign and the one shaped like the letter "p" leading to accidentally translating baby as fool. Ironically I really don't want to be seen as either while a baby or fool especially since I'm new. I've really enjoyed meeting my tribe mates but I'm afraid to see where the pleasant meet and greet ends and the game begins.
Maynor
My thoughts on this tribe is that i like everyone and i dont want any of them to leave. Ive been trying to talk to everyone n try to be social player since im sitting out the first challenge.
Blake
welp. i still dont really know whats going on but... IM HAVING FUN. Ive talked with Dylan C a bunch and we have gotten to know each other pretty well. The greek challenge? a MESS. I havent been able to do a lot and the little i have done is not even worth mentioning. I hope the next challenge is a little easier for me but until then... YAY! 
Maynor
Last night Brittany and I started talking and decides since we are newbies that we will work as a duo to keep each other safe since the game has newbies & returning players. As of right now she is my #1 but i am talking to others.
Maynor
Second day has been very interesting. Ive been talking to Cal and J.G. pretty much all day seperately. And both want to align and J.G brought up maybe doing three person alliance and he said we should try n bring in Cal. In my head i was like yes. So now its an allince of me, Cal, and J.G. which is great. If its all 100% (my end it is) then this is going to be great.
Timmy
Wow, I haven't made a confessional yet. WE WON IMMUNITY!!! I'm very relaxed now, but also I don't think I would have gone anyways so woot woot. I did the worst on my tribe so that's not too great (pretty sure the 810 from the post was my score), but I still did better than the entire other tribe so wooo. I'm so happy to finally be in a game with Abbey and I really want to work with her and we have been talking already about the nothingness that has come from our idol hunts so that's good. I still haven't talked to Zach or Brittany so I need to do that soon, Zach seems nice in the tribe chat but Brittany seems nonexistent at the moment even though she did well in the challenge. 
Cam
well i may have won a main season last night
but let me tell you
WE DID NOT WIN THAT MY DUDES LMAO. we were literally beat ten times over. i hope the f tribe feels good about how much they squished us. they... earned that. truly. 
but now jay says... there's an announcement? and this is what immediately ensues
On 7/21/18, at 9:29 PM, Jay 🐠 (Kalokairi Host) wrote:
> but first there will be an announcement
On 7/21/18, at 9:29 PM, Cameron Culpepper (Atomic Admin) wrote:
> oh no
On 7/21/18, at 9:31 PM, Dylan R. wrote:
> oh cool
and it was just announced! so there is redemption. this is nice! i'm less worried about work now. like obviously i'm gonna do my best? but... if i fuck up at least there's a CHANCE.
oh yeah and the idol. day 2 in the game, still haven't told anyone, so that's pretty cool! we'll see how long that lasts.
dylan c and i had a conversation about how if we don't work together neither of us will hold it against the other but like... im pretty sure we're gonna work together anyway. 
wouldn't it be cute to make f3 with dylan c and abbey? god that's the dream. but it won't happen.
Maynor
The alliance is official between me, JG, and Cal. Are alliance name is MEW but greek that looks like mew. I like both and i hope they are ride or die as i am with this alliance. But just so we could have one more vote, im keeping my ally, Brittany, secret for now. 
Mitch
Welcome to Greece! I consume goat cheese, so I'm something of a Greek expert myself you know. I'm very excited to meet all of my tribemates but now I'm probably going to talk about them individually since Idk what else to do
I haven't played a game in so long I have no fucking idea how to socialize oh my god. I feel like everything I type is awkward and sad. At least the first challenge was relatively easy since I never had to type anything and have free time up the wazoo . But fuck we got crushed lmao. I dunno what secret they used but I take comfort in knowing that they were probably worried about us doing the same thing. Maybe I probably won't get voted out for having a score of 600 but WE SHALL SEE
Alex - Where is he? He did the challenge but he hasn't said a word ever. I want to keep him but uh Blake - 15 exp huh. 15? :| I only got increments of 10 where did the 5 come from Cameron - Aaaa. I enjoy Cameron and hopefully he enjoys me Dylan C - Oh this distinguishing between Dylans will be fun. But hopefully this Dylan and I can... meet in the middle somewhere yes Dylan R - One of the 4 people who have spoken to me! This kid is GOING PLACES and I'm glad to help him along for the ride Maddie - She is camping and I completely understand. Matt - I mean sure Matt and I KNOW each other but do we really? It's not like we were buddy buddy in Navarino. Unless he thinks we were? If he does... uh oh
How do I bond with people
Cal
Maynard just brought together me and JG together to start an alliance all while the results of the immunity challenge was finished. I was nervous but not only did we win but we have an amazing three that is called ΜΞΨ(after the first letters of our names), which is called that thanks to me! I just thought it'd be fun to name it like a frat since we've been learning greek and also hopefully dominate! JG and Maynard are great guys and I'm excited to work with them as ΜΞΨ but I also am keeping in mind ΜΞ(me lol) in the game for when we do have to go to tribal! Mu Xi Psi out!
Dylan R
For the first tribal, I'm obviously worried. As for targets, I'm not sure there are any at this moment. I guess I'm voting based on tribal performances, but I would be open to other people's suggestions. I would consider myself closest to Matt, Dylan C and Mitch so those three are who I would want to vote with. 
Stephen
I found half a “special idol” in the mangroves! While I am happy and I will still search for the other half I do have to decide if I want to tell anyone. In a previous season I told one person and they betrayed me (thanks tim) but in the end that led the person who had other half to reach out to me. However I can’t expect the same thing to happen this game, every games a new game. So I think I’m gonna keep it to myself, if somebody else tells me or is revealed to have the other half I might tell them, but for now I’m just gonna search for the other half and be content that no one can use the whole thing against me.
Zach
We won the first challenge!!!! I was expecting it to be a lot closer tbh. But I have an alliance of 3 that I’m fairly confident in! I wouldn’t say I completely trust them yet though. Both of them have played before and so it’s scary to think that they might just be playing me. I guess time will tell. I’m also curious to see what other alliances will show themselves when we finally start talking and going to trial. Also a little worried that I might be playing to hard out of the gate. We’ll see and I’ll probably get used to playing as time goes on.
JG
My mom (Jay) has officially cancelled me y'all. My tribe freaking won by over 13 to almost 2k. Holy crap. Like did the vets on the other side never play this comp before? Like with maybe a little work and patience, you could get easily 1500XP without really grinding maybe more. I am honestly perfectly o.k. with these results I wanted us to win badly because of having to go to work tonight, I did not want to bother with the stress of that. Plus, the night before my work had an emergency so I am definitely not in a place ready to emotionally invest and make a move in the game. ΜΞΨ is an alliance that formed between Maynor, Cal, and myself. The alliance names from the first letter of our names in Greek to kinda make a frat/sor name. Maynor approached me wanting to make  a final 2 and go really far. I am down with this for now of course, this game is constantly changing and moving. He asked me if we wanted to make a threesome to help our odds and asked me for suggestions. I suggested Cal because I knew I wasn't in any other alliances with him yet and this will allow me to keep an eye on him making sure he doesn't get close to Timmy or Stephen. Before I went off for the night Stephen and I officially talked about how the vets probably should create an official thing because it wouldn't hurt for us to work at least together in the early stages of the game. We decided that it should be discussed and formed today. Once that happens your boy is literally in an alliance with everyone besides Brittany and she actually did really well in the challenge. This scares me that she is either close to others or just someone I am not gonna be able to connect with. I heard from others that people are forgetting she's here, at the least she is a competitor. Either this is gonna blow up in my face or gonna allow me to position myself really well going into merge. Mama mia, my tribe isn't going tribal but I feel I made some of the biggest moves. Time will tell, I guess 
Zabbey
SO A lot has happened since I last confessed!!!! I am now in a baby alliance with JG and Zach which is wholesome. Zach is super hype and its v endearing and im a stan. JG also said him and Stephen have talked about a vet alliance which would be the easier way to go but I don't really want to. I don't want to play this game based off of outside relationships, I'm not necessarily going to align with Cam and Dylan is we make it onto the same tribe. In more impotant news ya bITCH FOUND THE IDOL! My literal third search! Timmy told me that he was looking in the hotel rooms so I was gonna do that but then Jay said roof and I was like why not and my witch ass gave that offering and got me a sexy idol! I don't plan on telling anyone about it unless I absolutely have to! 
Blake
I'm realizing now that im probably going to be seen as invisible the whole time bthrfnm dont know if thats good or bad LOL. But I finally have an alliance and its with people that I actually enjoy talking too :) Me, Cameron and Dylan C formed a group called Bicons (Bi Icons LMAO) and they seem to be really loyal. I have no idea what im doing but i hope people find me funny and want to keep me hfuiejf. (I HAVE NO IDEA WHO IM GONNA VOTE OFF)
Maddie
I came into this game after 2 nights had already gone by. I am really scared that I will be voted out tonight because I would be the easy since not very many people know me.  
Dylan R
The first tribal is the most important tribal, at least from a game perspective. That’s why I’m taking a gamble and trying to target after Blake. We need people who will win challenges, and after his score of 15 I’m not sure if he’s best suited. I need 4 votes to tie. I believe I’ll have Alex & Maddie, so right now I’m focusing on the fourth vote. Dylan C seems wary about this vote, so I’m trying to convince her now. I told her that “other people have mentioned Blake” when really it’s just me lol. I don’t wanna tell anyone else, simply because I don’t want people thinking I’m playing too hard, so I’m hoping the votes will tie or the votes will be spread. I’m taking a bit of a gamble because this could put a target on my back, but I do love gambles so I can’t resist. This will probably come back to bite me, but it is redemption island so I guess that’s always a fallback.
Cal
Missed a lot of discussion about past games because I was meeting up with someone impromptu. It's daunting but also exciting to face the experience of some of my tribe mates. It's the feeling of a glorious revolution of the new players against the old! I aim to learn as well, but also have really enjoyed speaking with my tribe but fear people are getting wind of the ΜΞΨ alliance since me, JG, and Maynor are speaking a lot. I gotta figure out my mist! Mu Xi Psi out!
Stephen
The tribe chat: Jay is about to get represented by an agent!!!!! ajdnfkksxjsnxxcz
Cal in my PMs: I just got laid
............okay cal. I guess he ws just being friendly? But things like that are sort of a hot topic for me, but I don’t think thats something he needs to know. And its probably not something to get into in confessionals. Maybe if we become besties we can have a dnm about it later.
Dylan C
https://youtu.be/8oaTFmpiv0I
Dylan R
The first tribal is the most important tribal, at least from a game perspective. That’s why I’m taking a gamble and trying to target after Blake. We need people who will win challenges, and after his score of 15 I’m not sure if he’s best suited. I need 4 votes to tie. I believe I’ll have Alex & Maddie, so right now I’m focusing on the fourth vote. Dylan C seems wary about this vote, so I’m trying to convince her now. I told her that “other people have mentioned Blake” when really it’s just me lol. I don’t wanna tell anyone else, simply because I don’t want people thinking I’m playing too hard, so I’m hoping the votes will tie or the votes will be spread. I’m taking a bit of a gamble because this could put a target on my back, but I do love gambles so I can’t resist. This will probably come back to bite me, but it is redemption island so I guess that’s always a fallback. 
Dylan R
Ok so like. Convincing people is hard lol. New tactic: I told Alex that people are targeting him in hopes that it’ll ignite him enough to save himself. I want Alex as an ally, but if he can’t save himself then I don’t want him as an ally
Brittany
so i'm late to making this confession but we won the first challenge and i'm still so?? happy about it?? and by a lot too, and there i was panicking and speeding through duolingo lmao. hopefully this is a sign and we stay doing this well lol
J.G.
Yeet,one last confessional before the round is over. I am honestly really anxious to see what happens at this tribal whether a vet or noob will go. While I do not think that this will be a prevalent theme in decision making, it something I am keeping in the back of my mind. I don't want people to be able use that against me to vote me out. That's why I will feel really inclined to stick with the vets if a vet is voted out tonight over a noob. Who knows what that tribe will do they have several options.
Finally, officially the vets (Abbey, Timmy, and Stephen as well as myself) finally came together to form an official alliance called The Nursing Home. I am really keeping an eye on Timmy and Stephen, they give me some minor sketch vibes but it could just be me over analyzing.
Well, 1 week down, several more to go. 
Dylan C
I’m getting a concerning amount of radio silence form some cast members. Is it because they’re inactive or ignoring me?? Lmao mattI'm so excited to be on Kalokairi! This has been a lifelong dream. Who wouldn't want to live on a gorgeous Greek island, where every piece of drama or sadness is resolved by breaking out into 70s Disco Pop and choreographing elaborate dance routines featuring wacky props like scuba fins? And to be able to play the game of Survivor while doing it? Wild!
My tribe is literally so wholesome. The other "veterans" are all so fantastic, and the newbies are so pure and fun and I love talking to them. The only person I haven't gotten to speak one on one to is Alex, and it seems like that's the case for the rest of the tribe. After getting THWUMPED in that immunity challenge, it's nice that we can all come together in a cohesive vote to hopefully power through in the future.
I found a leather necklace at the market, but it doesn't actually do anything until I combine it with another part. I'm not sure if my best strategy is to keep it hidden or let everyone know I have it in case they're also looking for it, but I think I'm going to keep it to myself while I search a bit more.
I'd really like to work with Cameron long term, and I have a crush on Dylan R okay that is all goodnight.
Cam
so i've been wrestling with the decision on whether or not to tell Dylan C about the idol. 
I still haven't told him. Day 3! Nobody knows but me. that's pretty cool. 
it's pretty quiet around the vote right now? everyone is still asleep i think, and morale is a little low following last night. 
-----
I didn't submit that before I left for work, rip
Cam, certified short term memory loss haver
Alex was unanimously eliminated.
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kogancs · 6 years
Note
♥ AND ❀
some rp postivity . @bluechose . accepting !
♥ What’s the absolute best experience you’ve had in RP?
honestly i ?? dont think that ive ever had like. a singular best rp experience. rp is something ive been doing since i was p much first allowed access to the internet, so its kind of just been. a constant in my life. no, now that i think about it more, i think i actually do have a proper answer for this question in that about ?? 5 years ago ?? damn thats so long ago. anyway, like 5 years ago my irl friend group and i started a big d//anganronpa rp in which we split up all the characters amongst ourselves, and we had randomized ‘murders’ and ‘murderers’ kept secret from the rest of the group, and once a week we’d meet at lunch at school and hold a trial in which we tried to figure out the ‘murder’ based on the clues the ‘victim’ and ‘killer’ worked out together throughout the course of the week. we did this for so long that we looped through the whole cast of characters multiple times. and, yeah, we were a group of idiot ninth graders standing in a circle outside trying to figure out a fake murder based on a mediocre video game, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
❀ What is your favorite thing about your current fandom or RP community?
everyone is so damn nice ???? its like. the rpc in particular is trying to make up for the wild garbagestorm that the rest of the fandom is and its. honestly i was very scared about joining the rpc at first. id literally just gotten into the show and all i had to go off of regarding the fandom was the horror stories my friends told me, but ?? ive never been accepted into a rpc so fast, ive never had so many people express concern, love, or offer help for me, ive never even made friends online before. it hasn’t been all good experiences ( especially in regards to me still learning things about this fanbase in particular ), but all the good that has happened and how ?? sweet you all are ?? has made up for a lot of it
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pcurrytravels · 6 years
Text
Las Vegas: A Love/Hate Thang (Chapter IV - A Question of Love, Pride & Knowledge) (Part II)
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Hello once again. So in Part I of this chapter I started off talking about having Love, Pride AND Knowledge in/of Las Vegas, but I had so many things to say about the love and pride parts that the post grew way too long for me to talk about the knowledge part. Here, I will be talking more about that part, let us begin:
As I’ve already stated a few times, there’s a number of things I tend to envy about other cities both within and outside of the U.S. Like how just about every other major city in the world has some sort of rail system and we don’t (that stupid monorail doesn’t count). Or how everyone else seems to appreciate variance in their architecture while we use the same set of five bland and generic blueprints for any structure that isn’t a casino here. Or how history and culture can almost literally be felt in the air in most places versus here where all that can be felt is corporate, commercial and trendy modernity. Or how most other cities like to identify their neighborhoods and we don’t.
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Yeah, more about that last one: Now, I understand that Las Vegas isn’t really a big city and that it’s also relatively new. Then again, a metropolitan area of two-million people (and still rapidly growing) is pretty far from what I’d call a small town (even if the rule of six degrees of separation is very much in effect mode here *groans*). Also most other cities in the Southwest and West Coast aren’t all that much older than we are. Matter of fact, this place was officially settled in 1905, i.e. 113 years ago, so it’s not like we haven’t had time to naturally develop, define and identify districts and neighborhoods like other places do. So really, what’s the excuse? 
Oh wait scratch that, our city is divided up into distinctive neighborhoods: There’s DTLV, which further consists of East Fremont, 18b Arts District, The Naked City, John S. Park and Huntridge. The Eastside can be divided up into the University District, Cambridge, Paradise Palms, Francisco Park, Sunrise and so on. The Westside has Charleston Heights, Rancho-Oakey/Medical District, The Old or “Historic” Westside, Berkeley Square and The Lakes. We also now have a Chinatown (which is more of a Pan-Asian district really) in addition to slowly emerging East African, Central American, Caribbean Latino, South Asian and Pacific Islander enclaves. Ask the average Las Vegan about all of this however? Chances are they’d probably have no idea what you’re talking about.
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So, how would the average Las Vegan describe this city, you ask? Simple: The Strip, Downtown, Summerlin, Henderson, Westside, Eastside, Northtown, Southwest, Northwest/Centennial and that’s it. Occasionally, some will refer to Spring Valley, Green Valley and Aliante, but even those are slowly becoming obscure. Spring Valley has more or less been (ignorantly and lazily) divided into three: the older, more working-class portion that’s east of Rainbow is considered Westside, the newer, more affluent portion that’s west of Rainbow has been merged with Summerlin, and anything south of Trop on either side is part of the Southwest. Green Valley and Henderson are more or less considered one and the same these days (they aren’t). As for Aliante, given its location and, ahem, demographics if you will, many will insist to you it’s just an extension of Northtown (the classism and closet racism runs thick in these parts). 
As a writer and general “web-worm” if you will, with all of the extensive research I’ve done on various topics, one thing I’ve come to realize is how much everything “reflects” so to speak. Language? Culture? Fashion? Politics? Societal Roles? Music? etc.... All of these things and more influence and are because of each other more or less. 
You may be asking what I’m getting at here, yes? Well, I’ve already indirectly alluded as to how the identity and culture of my city has been buried beneath a shallow, vapid and artificial shell in the previous posts of this series, which is where we come to a theory: The reason why so many of these neighborhoods aren’t regularly referred to/identified, let alone even known, whether due to being forgotten over time, laziness or the long-standing, stubborn insistence on sloppily dividing this entire city into five or six primary quadrants, is because acknowledging these areas would show that something actually happened organically and naturally in Las Vegas, thereby betraying the “fantasy” of being a place where everything was made/built overnight. 
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The honest truth of the matter is, artificiality is HIGHLY valued here. The majority of our populace just simply doesn’t place value on anything that wasn’t created with the “build it and they will come” philosophy in mind. I mean, the High Roller is widely regarded as an icon of our city and it hasn’t even been around for five years for goodness sake. You see, unlike just about everywhere else in the world where people actively give things meaning on a daily basis, here, we have to literally be told how to feel about them. (Hate to sound petty, as I am a legit fan, but I honestly wonder if the Golden Knights would have even been as successful as they have if it weren’t for them being explicitly marketed as hometown heroes by local media long before they even hit the ice, just saying) Otherwise, we either don’t know or don’t care. This right here is what we have to blame for the messy situation in regards to neighborhood identification, and by extension, why so many locals don’t even know their own city. 
Even I will admit to you there’s many things about my city I simply don’t know. Granted, I don’t have much of a social life beyond my day job and the internet so that could be a big part of why I’m out of the loop in certain areas, but still. Example: A few months ago, I remember talking with a former coworker who happened to be of Indonesian descent. She gushed to me about the large Indonesian community in town and all the cultural offerings and I was just sitting there like......where? 
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Given a number of circumstances, so to speak, Las Vegas’s population is skyrocketing with no end in sight. The thing I fear most is, aside from increased rent (the valley only has so many housing options), lack of housing stock (the valley only has so much room for expansion) and how much harder it’s gonna be to find a job (the valley never had that many great jobs to begin with), is our city’s identity getting buried even further. If the trends I’ve observed throughout my life are anything to go by, 90% of people relocate here because of one sole arbitrary reason (be it cheap housing, The Strip or The Raiders) and that’s it. 90% of pre-existing locals (well, prior to Oct. 1, 2017 and the Golden Knights anyway) simply don’t know or care about their city. For this city to be growing at the rate it is, this is a deadly combo yo. Things are changing once again in Vegas, but I’m not sure if I can really say they’re good or bad this time. 
A pro to all of the people moving in is more diversity and culture. That being said however, would it really be our own? Although people from literally all over the world have moved here over the years, the vast majority of transplants, past and present, have been from California, and it doesn’t look like that’s gonna stop anytime soon. I mean, when it’s $500k or more to buy and/or $2000 a month to rent rundown houses, condos and apartments in the GHETTO, I certainly don’t blame them one bit for fleeing to a town where one can easily find a fairly new home in the nicer parts for $200k. The issue lies in the fact that as time goes on, Vegas becomes less like Vegas and more like a miniature L.A. This is going to sound VERY provincial and xenophobic of me, but frankly, I’m tired of Californians making this place a carbon-copy of California. I’d prefer to take the 4-hour bus ride/road trip and/or 1-hour plane ride so I could have the real thing, thanks. 
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Okay, I got a bit off track there, lol, but anyways, given that it appears Vegas Natives are going to remain a minority in their own city, it will most likely be outsiders who will identify and define things for both the foreseeable, and unforeseeable future. Ironically enough, I honestly don’t think I have a right to feel very upset about it when so many of my fellow natives and locals have simply allowed this to happen thanks to their apathy and lack of knowledge in regards to their own city. In countless other places, such circumstances would cause quite the uproar, but here, it’s whatever. So all I can do is shrug and keep it moving at this point. 
After all, it appears I really have no choice but to simply accept this paradox. Our culture is one very much based on trends and the material. Our local identity is one of people and things that all come from somewhere else. Our image is one of fantasy and imagination. As one person, I just don’t have much control over it. Over the next ten years, Vegas is going to be more different than ever. Maybe the next generations of new arrivals and natives will be the ones to finally ground things in place. Maybe the Golden Knights and the Raiders will assist in strengthening the local community. I don’t know. All I can really do is hope. Otherwise (note that I’m cringing as I’m writing this), I’m just going to have to learn that it is what it is. Until next time. 
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ts-akhmim · 4 years
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Episode 7 “It's a Hot Mess Express “ - Scott
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People are so hard to work with. I get they don't like this challenge truly I do but I just wish they wouldn't keep shutting down every idea I had. It's... annoying. I get that I'm also the problem here. Because if an entire room full of people is saying you're wrong then you're probably wrong but still. I dislike being shut down. I've just been feeling kind of isolated since my name was written down. Even in my own alliance it seems like everyone thinks less of me for being paranoid. It doesn't help that I'm not entirely pop culture savvy so a lot of their convos I'm a bit out of the loop on. Part of me wonders if it's cause I'm in a male dominated environment? I don't think they are sexist but I do think that I'm being unintentionally ignored. Like throughout the duration of this confessional I have submitted 6 ideas/comments to the group and they've either been left in the dust or dismissed. That has to mean something right? Is it my personality? Did I come on too strong with my enthusiasm? Do they think I'm bossy? Socializing doesn't exactly come naturally to me. If anyone had met me 4 years ago you'd probably be in the know. You know that ability where you can pick up what people imply, whether through body language or through hidden meanings. I don't. I literally was born with out that ability and it has done whatever the opposite of wonders are for my life. At first I thought it was fine, I thought hey no big, everything is good, people like me eventually. But then I played Malaysia... A lot of great things came out of that game, a lot of good friendships and memories but in a way it sort of haunts me. When the confessionals came out, for the first time ever I saw what people thought about me. Sure they liked me eventually but they also disliked me. Like really really didn't like me at all. It was my first real interaction with people outside of the treatment school I went to, it was my first real interaction with the rest of the world and people hated my guts. Don't get me wrong I always suspected I was disliked but... to see their actual written thoughts on paper was hard. Of course as they got to know me they started to like me but I couldn't forget that it wasn't always like that. That at one point they looked at me or their screen or whatever and saw a pest. And that's my biggest fear, that I'm the problem. That no matter where I go people see me and are filled with dread or disgust. That people are always wishing me some from of ill because I'm bad at conversation or sort of creepy. Well at least they came to their own conclusions now, maybe they pulled their heads out of their asses or because it wasn't me they were actually able to function. God this spiraled, I only wanted to complain about how shitty my tribe was being not go on this full blown existential rant. Fuck me am I right? I'm not sure what this is going to contribute to the game. There is no hashtag big moves or fun comments but like I already typed this up so I'm not going to delete it like a pussy. 
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Ok now we can talk whew. UMMMM not Connor fucking up Duncan's perfect record! Now that I'm over the shock, thank you Connor because I'm 95% sure that obsession is the reason Duncan did the most to make sure Devon voted me instead of him back on Thoth https://giphy.com/gifs/mamovie-stalking-octavia-spencer-eavesdropping-j5uEVYERR0ncYlJ36e Really pleased with how the game is shaping up tbh, assuming I don't lose another music video challenge hahaha. I would LOVE a final 3 with me, Ali, and Devon but I know that's a long way off so I'm just focusing on the here and now. My biggest concern is protecting Ali. Essentially Duncan hit me up to work with him, TJ, and Jordan and I was very much like lol not sure about that. Mainly because Jordan and I don't have a strong relationship? And Duncan was like yeah but he wants to get to know you better and I'm like https://giphy.com/gifs/week-wtf-moments-QjIz1AqkGTszK If that's the case, that needs to come from Jordan and then it's between me and Jordan. Why someone else is interceding on Jordan's behalf is very dicey to me but I'm not that surprised because that continues to be a theme with Duncan: getting me to fit into plans that best suit him. Y'all know DAMN well Jordan Pines don't wanna go to the end with me and the feeling is mutual. But I HAVE to make it work with Jordan or Duncan will get pissy. He literally was like ok well who are you close with and I felt a serious feeling in my gut to not mention Ali. So I said oh I talk to Adam a lot but I wouldn't say I trust Adam. So after telling Ali all of this lmao, we decided I needed to go back to Duncan and say yes because it would keep me in the know and keep both of us safe. Also it allows me to keep an eye on Jordan and Duncan at the same time so we truly stan. And the gag is I'm not scared of Jordan Pines and I welcome the challenge of getting him out so love yall for letting me in through the front door hahaha My new issue is just timing. We'll be ok if we win this next challenge but if not, I could see that alliance targeting Ali. Obviously I have a plan and will put the vote on someone else but I really want to prolong turning on that group for as long as I can. I don't wanna spook TJ and I know killing Jordan will leave me with a pissed Duncan and I really don't need that based on how seriously he's playing. So I'm hoping I can finesse somehow? Maybe one of them gets idoled out at merge and then a blindside on the other won't be as messy. But yeah I keep feeling like the walls are closing in, in terms of allies, and I'm working HARD to make sure I have an exit strategy at all times haha cause fuck these men I'm trying to win again. I "love everyone" which means I have no problem voting out anyone
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So let me just make sure i got this right, connor tried to get people to vote for me, they all told me, he "planned" with me to go for liam, then....he votes for duncan and he goes home unanimously? little did he realize when he went around and gave a feeble attempt at rallying people to vote for me, i had already rallied everyone to go for him and made sure everyone knew he was a liar and couldnt be trusted, you know im a firm believer in loose lips sink ships and i absolutely used my big mouth as my weapon to sink his ship. Even if there turns out to be some majority alliance that did this all without me then well...i guess that's another story but im still taking my hard earned credit because either way i got what i wanted one way or another so im here for it, sorry gal! i now find myself in a position i hope i can make some moves with, duncan already just made a vague to comment to me about how "it only takes 4 now" which he's right, and he mentioned autumn, himself, me, and ali. Which, that's a 4 I would love to go forward with for the time being, i like to think ive had good genuine talks with them 3 in particular, and now we can start get together maybe lock something in and if we make it to a merge or even another swap we at least have something to work with with each other, but we'll see, we gotta focus on immunity first now, id love to win just to for sure see any of the other people who lied to me go home oop so while i may be feeling ok now i just have to remember to simmer down and play smart and make the right connections with the right people i need and saying the right things to whomever needs to hear it, because that's what i do best in these type of games to stay alive, i feel like my intuition has been leading me ok so far this game so im just gonna keep basing my decisions off that and charging forward PERIOD and ill damn sure do it with or without the help of the tomb because a bitch can not get in ive tried over and OVER at this point im back to pounding on the door of it just hoping if im annoying enough yall will let me in!
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i'll do a proper game confessional later but me and dan are both judges for the svalbard music video challenge and its so sad that we cant talk... its like... this could be us working on a music video if things were different kjlsdfa its missing dan and jake hours
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Whew! Sorry about that what happened was I ran out of anxiety meds a few days and that rant was the commutation of being with out sanity pills for three days! Everything is fine! I am fine! People are fine! I am sorry to the future Thoth 2.0 tribe, you are all great, I just get very spirally when I am without some sort of stabilizing force! Sorry to the hosts for using this as a diary this is not a diary this is survivor... Anyway this time I have some more constructive things to add! Okay so things are fine. Dan and I continue to bond, though he had to call me out on being bad at communication in order for our relationship to progress. I get it was like a check point or whatever and frankly I appreciated it. Like I said in my rant yesterday I have massive paranoia when comes to interacting with people and whether they like me or not, so constructive feedback while annoying is always helpful. Plus through research I found that he values a good social game so the fact that he's reaching out and telling me what I'm doing wrong is probably a sign that I'm not a lost cause :D. It turns out we have a few mutual friends our lord and savior John Coffey and also Sarah,... Lynn to be specific there are like a shit ton of Sara(h)s so should probably clarify lol. I want to work with him. I know he's in the majority alliance with the brawn tribe, which also contains Jakey and Jordan. Considering the fact that the beauties are slowly but surely getting eliminated, their favor would be helpful to me and mine. However, I know for sure that one of them wrote my name down. Honestly probably both of them. I know I keep harping on this fact but I just really really don't like the idea of looking like an idiot by aligning with someone who wanted me dead or wanted to fuck with me. If we do lose this challenge we are going to have to figure out who to keep or who to eliminate, I feel like it should be between those two. Mostly because I'm not exactly comfortable with a brawn majority. Like I know how people are saying tribe lines don't matter and while they don't, advantages do. And what more advantageous than being in a majority alliance? If we get rid of a brawn that would make it 4 brains- 4 beauty - 5 brawn. Which seems a bit more fair lol. Also RIP Connor remember how I said he was a threat? Welp I guess this is why they don't ask me for cast assessments :/ and also cause I was dead for like several years.
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absolutely nothing has happened in fact i was kinda in a ~mood~ today so i feel like my social game took a big L because i didnt feel like talking to anyone and i was busy so i kept being that bitch to responding once an hour ..... but in other news i finally accessed the tomb, and once i started using more than one brain cell at a time i was able to get in and it was actually about 10x easier than i was making it out to be im not sure WHY i was struggling so much but of course, to no surprise i finally get in and the pedestal is empty AGAIN. Now there's not only at least 1 idol from the last time i went in the tomb gone, but there's possibly a second too, if not an advantage that can easily be played against me. At this point all i can do is try and recover a little bit, tomorrow ill have to just try more with my conversations and hopefully one of the people i can somewhat trust is the person who has whatever was in their time time around but probably not, it's never that easy
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okay so i have a video confessional from earlier uploading which is kind of a recap of the last two rounds BUTTT!! liam just finished editing our video and i love it!! he did so good and our tribe all tried our best... im just hoping the other tribe didn't go bananas all out, because if they didn't we should hopefully win... i really wanna win immunity because otherwise i feel like adam is gonna be the vote and i dont want that anymore KJASDFA. i would just be sad because idk who the alternative would even be.... so basically we better win immunity KJLSADFA
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Me: Alright everyone, make sure you film horizontally!!! Devon: Fuck you
Honestly!!! I take back what i said about Kendall. I feel like we’re making some strides to work together??? Or she’s playing me? I’m hoping to stir a Devon vote this round because I think he threw the vote on Kendall to piss me off, but who knows. I wanna talk to Jakey and see what he thinks about a me/him/augusto/Amir alliance to get through this vote? Idk I trust him but who knows!!!! Maybe everyone is lying to me??? 
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okay... i know i said god is a woman and her name is autumn but its time for the remix. god is a woman and her name is alyssa's mum because alyssa's mum just rescued us from defeat in that challenge JKASDF the judges were kinda unnecessarily harsh but we move on. basically for the other tribe's tribal, i hope jake/dan/devon live... hopefully another scary old school person goes but tbh who knows what is going to happen?! im just so happy to have made f13, i said i'd come 14th in my intro so we love surpassing my own expectations
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the immunity challenge went well, we won, which is good because i just didnt feel like going to tribal council because im honestly unsure what the hell is going on, i wanted to feel good about the connor vote because obviously that was my plan from the start however he just made it a little too easy by not talking to a lot of people allegedly, up until right before the vote, i dont think there'd be an easy vote next time we go to tribal, unless ... it's me... am i the easy vote?? i wanna really think im not but its just always too quiet to me when we dont go to tribal there's also lots of talk and speculation about a possible merge at 13, but me and my vivid imagination aka paranoia think maybe another swap of some sort could still happen even if for just another round or 2, i never knew with you sneaky hosts!! also i know we won in the challenge but we wouldve won in the challenge by even more if liam used more footage of my video i sent in i feel like i got no screentime!!! but of course i kept my big mouth shut for once because there's no i in team so ill try not to throw too much of a diva fit but listen... i tried to give yall a DEATH DROP, and i pulled a wig ruveal by snatching off my hat, and i was giving you a whole tik tok dance i made myself..... but there was no way i was doing more than beyonce's part so he didnt have much to work with so touche .... the full version i made will just be deleted scenes for myself ill reflect on when im more mature and think to myself "what the fuck was i doing?" 
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So not to my surprise, we end up losing the challenge AGAIN!! I've just accepted that I really don't have any luck in this game. I was really hoping that we'd just win every challenge until the merge because I'm over going to tribal and voting people out. I feel like going to the amount of tribal councils that I have has left a huge target on my back. But at the same time, I'm playing the game more than other are. Maybe I have that going for me, who knows. Anyways, the Thots alliance is deciding on either Devon or Dan for this vote. I basically told them I was good with either, even though I would perfer to keep Devon so that I at least have more of an opportunity to rebuild our relationship. I've made it very clear that if the group as a whole wanted to do Devon that I'd write his name down to prove that I trust this group moving forward. So we decide to go with Dan for this vote, and this doesn't really sit well with Jakey. I'm not surprised by that, since I know he's wanted Kendall out for awhile now. But he is really adamant that he doesn't want Dan to go. Which I get, he thinks that Dan would trust him moving forward. When it comes to Dan though, his social game lacks so much that it's like "I don't even know if I can trust him moving forward". And I think the fact that Jakey more so wants to target Kendall this round instead of Dan is a strong sign for me. I'm pretty positive he has an idol since the brain one has been found and he's lied to me about clues before. So this has me thinking, maybe it's a good time to get Jakey out this round? Thinking about it numbers wise for the future, we don't really need Jakey's vote for a majority this round since the four beauties and myself makes 4, and if we bring in Devon that's 5. Plus, I don't even think that Jakey's under the impression that he would... get voted out this round. He seems offly confident that he's staying, just that Dan's going. But I like to think he'd let Dan be a sinking ship and go.. Idk I'm gonna try to pitch this to Amir and see what he thinks. I kind of tried to hint around it to Augusto that Jakey wasn't cool with it, but Augusto kind of turned a blind eye at that. And I don't trust Kendall with my thoughts since she's very blunt... so I wouldn't be surprised if she leaked my plans. Similarly to what Devon did when I voted him out last week. I'm hoping that Amir will see where I'm coming from and that he might be open to that concept. For all I know, I could be voted out this round. And honestly, that'd be the smart move for them to make because my perception in the game so far has been pretty spot on. I think my self awareness this time around has been an asset for me, so I'm hoping that I can get by this vote and hopefully enter the merge soon. 
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Coming back into the game, I knew I needed to open up a bit and start to Slither earlier than I would imagine. After throwing a vote onto Kendall, I broke down any chance between the Beauty and Brawn working together to knock out myself and Scott. I haven't told anyone about my vote, and don't plan to. Going into this vote, Dan should be the obvious choice. OG Brawn hasn't suffered any additional losses in numbers, and I'm just too close with Augusto/Amir/Kendall to consider flipping. In preparation of tonight NOT being a swap, I established an alliance with Amir and Augusto. They are a duo in every sense, but attaching myself to them sets up the opportunity to at least CONSIDER voting out Scott next round. It would have to be between him and Scott. 
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All I got to say is oof… I genuinely thought I was on vacation after the last round like I’ve been SO bad about talking to people or at least that’s how I felt cause I was operating at 60% instead of the 110% I do when I socialize. That being said, I have my goals that I want to stick to and see happen. Dan needs to leave this tribal so I can get Jakey out next even if Dan leaving makes me really sad. Dan leaving takes a number away from the Brawn and a number away from Jakey, who I am able to get out by keeping Devon and having him/Kendall/myself/Amir vote for him if we happen to lose again. The alliance of me/Kendall/Amir/Jakey/Scott went on call last night and it was deadass an hour and a half long call where everyone was like “idk who should go but I’m fine with whatever” although… that certainly wasn’t the case. I, personally, made points that were pro-Devon such as Devon not having any clear allies to reunite with at merge and things like that and EVENTUALLY at the last 5 minutes of the call, we decided that Dan leaving is the better option. Scott and I even discussed a Brawn having to go before we even did the call so yeah. One thing I could tell though? Jakey was not having it. I understand his frustration but you can’t have your cake and eat it too. I voted out AJ to prove that I am not here to play by tribal lines and you said you would do the same but here we are… Amir called me last night telling me about how Jakey was trying to strong arm him into voting Devon out because Jakey didn’t want to do Dan… like sir, I’m? I’m very happy that Amir came to me and confided in me to kinda spill out his emotions like that makes me <3 but it also made me wanna pop off at Jakey because I don’t like those approaches in games hgfjdks even if I do really like Jakey, I was just ugh gjfdks. That aside, I feel like I am doing good about getting information and building friendships out here like I’m DEADASS is almost every single alliance on the tribes I’ve been a part of and while I don’t get tons of info from direct sources (ie. Jakey), I get the information from close allies (ie. Amir) which in a way can be even better? That being said, I’ve been way too good at forming friendships that every vote makes me feel really bad? With Dan for example, I adore that man like even if he isn’t the most talkative he’s just amazing. But does Dan benefit my game as much as Devon? Not really, even if Dan wanted to align. I’m sticking to my promise of doing what I have to do and be a little bit more cutthroat than I usually am because I do genuinely want to win this game and I’ll do what it takes to get there. Honestly, I’d be SHOOK if we do not merge next round or the round after ghfjdksm but I’m just trying to plan ahead and look at my connections. My Thoth connections are Amir > Kendall > Devon > Scott > Jakey whereas my Hathor connections are Autumn > Duncan > Adam (?) > TJ > Jordan > Liam M > Ali. If we do merge, making a secret thing with Autumn would be KEY just to have another person in my corner but also I need to connect with a Brawn to be good with them yknow? It’ll definitely be interesting and I can see the merge being messier than a taco bell bathroom BUT I’m hyped at the same time?
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How is it already Day 16? There seems to be something seriously wrong with that. Anywho, I've let myself take a quick step back on the social game these last few days. I think I've put in the work to cement a couple strong groups here and can put myself in a good spot, but now I can avoid being the person that probably would be seen as a huge threat in the near future. Once merge hits (which I'm hoping is this next round), I'm going to have to go back to bringing that social game to a 9 (10 is where the Alyssa threat level begins), but right now I'm hopefully putting myself in a good place. In the event we don't have a merge and have one more vote on Hathor, I really think I need to make a move on Ali. I realize I keep saying this and I'm going to feel awful when he sees this all, but he is such a HUGE threat, and I can't let him skate by to where there's no room to stop him. I made that mistake last time in letting the person I knew would win get too far without me being able to stop them. Not this time. Ain't no fucking way.
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This may very well be my last confessional lmao. I’m just feeling very paranoid about this vote and honestly I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone votes for me except for Jakey. Or if he even flips to the majority against me. And honestly! I’ve come to terms with it. I really tried my best in the game and I can’t be mad about how I performed in this game specifically. I understand I’m a threat in these games and if people are worried about me end game, quite frankly they should be. I know that I’ve played Tumblr Survivor one too many times and should have quit while I was ahead. I know I’ve talked about working with Kendall and killing Devon, but honestly idk who is voting where. I think I’m going to try to just go with what I think is majority (against Kendall) and just hope to god I’m not going anywhere. I hate having this defeatist attitude, but if I get voted out I’m going to have zero hard feelings and take it in stride. I guess I’m just not cut out to win tumblr survivor ❤️
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Our video was so iconic, SHOUT OUT TO ALYSSA'S MOM!!! I should really be making sure im fortifying the bonds i've made but im really just happy to be on break and not have tribal. I've only been to tribal once within a 7 day time span instead of the 4 times in 7 days the brains endured before. I will say i was positively shook to get the vote from connor, but i never thought i could play a perfect game anyways lol. I'm hoping to god that dan or jakey go, i dont want the brawns over here to have other options than autumn and i come merge. Im surprised at myself because im starting to really want to stick with all these people come a merge, i suppose we'll see how it goes and how my attitude changes moving forward. 
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Sooooooo I actually felt kind of bad about voting for Dan until he was throwing my name out :/ I guess you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I'm kind of nervous now. Like Jakey told me this and he did the same thing to AJ. Also I haven't heard anything from Scott yet... that's sketchy right? Ugh I swear if I'm voted out then Alyssa's mom, I will meet you in the Denny's Parking lot for a fight. I'm not afraid to throw hands at the elderly, ask Drew. 
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We love when men listen to me an in turn we win immunity! This is now the second time that's happened lmao cause I sure did make everyone commit to a time block so we didn't play ourselves in the endurance challenge and I sure did suggest Telephone as the song choice so wooooo Not a lot has happened and I don't have a lot of time to talk to begin with but I have a strong feeling we are not merging tonight lmao. Tbh I look forward to another day on Hathor it's very chill over here, all things considered. Also I need a couple chill challenges the next two rounds cause ya girl is moving, graduating, and leading an underground movement all at the same time so don't set me up with a crazy time-consuming challenge lol
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I feel vindicated. Starting off in this game, I was not doing so well gameplay wise. Flash forward, I've been a big contributor physically, and socially too! I've got big plans, and I will carry this tribe again if I have to!
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(may've already submitted this but i'm worried i submitted it for day 18?)
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ok let me just start by saying: im in an emotionally FRAGILE state at the moment writing this right after the winners at war finale.....SPOILERS IF YOU HAVENT SEEN BUT I HAVE TO SAY IT....NATALIE AND WINCHELE ROBBED, as inspired as i am by my aries sistren natalie and think she should've won, im even more upset for my fellow beauty sister michele because lowkey? i absolutely LOVE the way michele plays, because in my own head at least i like to think i at least play slightly similar, i like to lay low and just adapt to where i see i can fit the best, anywho thats all ill say on that, back to THIS game dan being voted out last round, was kinda meh, i had the tiniest conversation with him during one world and he did end up giving me some tea about the brawns, but i couldve easily tried working with him later on against the beauties, PLUS him leaving means that none of those false beauties left, which is bad for me because i want them all gone oop and ive worked hard over here trying to make sure everyone knows they are threats even if theyre not working together, they went against me and lied to me, which means i cant trust them or work with them, which means i need to make sure no one else does either it's very nice though duncan has approached me and asked who i was comfortable with incase we did go to tribal and he said him and jordan pines were pretty close and honestly jordan is the only one ive been on a call with this whole game which is fine because anyone who knows me knows i dont care for calls much in this game and that usually hurts me so im hoping its not hurting me this time but truly, im not sure people are approaching me way more with information and plans then they ever have so im hoping thats a good sign, espcially with duncan saying he basically wanted me to be in the know with him, i think i can trust him as of now going foward and i hope the same about jordan pines, because first of all i love his energy and him as a person my fellow stoner crackhead, and second of all let's be real i definitely want to use him as a shield later on cmon the guy has a season named after him, forget denise being the queen slayer, i want to be the king tamer also in good with ali and autumn i think?? i personally enjoy my short little convos i have with them frequently so i just hope we're on the same page, but idk the little voice in the back of my head is telling me it all seems too good to be true almost like a perfect illusion and maybe duncan is tricking me trying to talk to me about "keeping this tribe strong", so i guess we'll have to wait until the next time we go to a tribal together to find out so yeah in conclusion, sorry to dan, and plot twist of the century im rooting for jakey to not be voted out the other tribe? even though im still convinced he could be making me his number 1 target especially if he gets in kahoots with kendall, but im hoping i played them against each other enough during the one world so that didnt happen 
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What do ya know....another tribal council. After only being exempt from one tribal, this has become somewhat of a routine. I am extremely confident in the numbers this round. I'm under the belief that everyone will be writing down Jake's name, and Jake will likely be writing down my/Kendall's name. Still, I believe there is a worry about idols. I would hate to be idoled out by Jake after everything I have worked towards...I can't afford to throw my vote on Kendall or Scott with the merge coming up so soon, because it fractures my game going into a potential merge...Somewhat of a "all or nothing" bet tonight.
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Me @ the brawns who have been on this tribe: https://media.giphy.com/media/szPZ2NXIGCMcE/giphy.gif
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So a couple new developments: 1. Jordan offered me a final two which I'm sooooo excited to see how that's going to turn out. I've really connected with Jordan this game (which admittedly I didn't think would happen before this game), but he's been the person I've confided in the most out here. So I really think this is going to be the start of something amazing. 2. With this F2 deal, Jordan told me that Amir/Jakey knew each other outside of this game. This is bad for me both because Jakey is supposed to be my other guy with Jordan, but also Amir is the person I'd want to target come merge (which should be next round). I have zero connection to him, he's proven to be good at comps, he's won this game before, and he doesn't add into my plan of having numbers on every side. So now I'm in a spot where I think I'll probably have to make a move against potentially my closest / other closest ally in this game. Being safe right before the potential merge feels amazing and opens a lot of opportunities, but is extremely scary knowing who is going to merge. Hopefully come to merge, I have a chance at the merge idol to avoid anyone else having the chance at getting it, because I need some added knowledge in this game.
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I am so fucking pissed at Devon. WHY ARE YOU ON THE BRAINS IF YOU HAVE NO BRAIN CELLS!!!!!!! dsfjkaafkjdaldjfjadksjads Great now I get to die!
I don't know why Jakey wants to kill me. I am not a threat. Like at all? Most of the strategies I come up with are bad and I am barely social? Sure I guess I can win like a challenge or two but not enough to be physical? I mean I'm trying to kill him but like... honestly he started it 2 rounds ago. I am a paper tiger worse I am a paper giraffe. Sure I'm tall but basically harmless and only sort of evil. At least I remember why I hated him so much. I don't hate him NOW, I'm 22 years old I have better things to do then hate some guy for trying to win a game. But I am annoyed and inconvenienced by this. Maybe a little hurt too because the only reason I can think to get voted out is because my personality sucks so much that he doesn't see a future where we can work together. Which is fair I guess? But I can't be that awful right? God this game is a constant existential crisis... Also I think people are annoyed with me for being paranoid and shit. Oh I'm sorry people who's name isn't getting written down, I'm sorry I'm not more pleasant while I'm in fear for my metaphorical life. 
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It’s a MESS ITS A FUCKING MESS SCOTTIE WANTS DAN OUT DAN WANTS DEVON JAKEY WANTS DEVON DEFON WANTS DAN AUGUSTO AND KENDALL WANT JAKEY AMIR WANTS NOT JAKEY OR AUGUSTO OR KENDALL I literally don’t have number in this game and I’m going to get fucked on at the merge 
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Okay so Augusto basically told him that his name was an option for this vote or the next one and Kendall told him that the brawns are bringing up his name and said that he was the throw away vote So now my gut is telling me dan did it and jakey was in on it But I don’t care, if that’s the case Everyone on this tribe wants a brawn out, EVERYONE I just have to make sure it’s not jakey Because Augusto and Kendall want jakey now and I refuse it Rn it seems they r okay doing dan It seems everyone is cool doing dan So I’m happy with that
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Jakey is fucking strong arming me r u joking Ndbdjdjsns Jakey talked to scottie And got scottie to want devon So now they’re gonna try and call the alliance tmmrw and change to vote back to devon over dan And if Augusto and Kendall don’t want to Jakey wants to pull brain and brawn to vote kendall like sir I’m literally getting strong armed, and he can’t see why people want dan out I could make a move rn But should I even I probably shouldn’t If they try to get kendall I will flip it on him 
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don’t know what to do I’m pleading so hard with jakey rn like hey it’s not good for me to go into merge with 6 brawn 4 beauty (dysfunctional) and 3 brain (dysfunctional) And I said I want to do dan is that okay like jakey u need to choose a side, brawns, or this tribe And he goes If u decide to do dan Then I’m gonna unite dan and Scott and Devon and vote kendall So if that’s the case, I’m sending u home theres no way around it then
Throw back to last night when I hung up on jakey to call Augusto and told jakey that I was taking a shower but literally I was gone for an hour and needed an excuse fast so I told him i shaved my ass call that strategic ass shaking 
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Okay so this tribal. Everyone on my tribe thinks jakey is evil and he’s just going to go back to the brawn tribe, which is like, wtf, he literally voted in minority on purpose and gave us leverage on him. Like he literally has put himself on the line multiple times. He ratted out the brawn majority over and over. Like jakey is not loyal to the brawns on the other side at all. The people on this tribe don’t give a shit and my opinion isn’t being heard at all, Kendall won’t budge and Augusto won’t budge, and Scott wants to keep devon. Can I just say scott is a rat, he is playing every single person. Jakey trusted him soooo much . Anyway, everyone wants jakey out for literallt no reason and jakey trusts me 100% and jakey is the best way to get info from the brawns on the other side. Anyway, KDJDKSN KDNDKD we are getting dirty. Jakey has an idol. And I told him he was the vote and I made it sound like it’s all Scott’s decision cuz I’m really tight with Kendall and Augusto, so now, jakey wants to idol out Scott Basically, it’s time for a cluster fuck and it’s time for chaos So at merge jakey and I will play from Opposite sides
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so jakey fking tried to flip the vote and he blew up the 5 person alliance to devon and hes fucking up my game so much nkwejfnkew god maybe i will try and get him out at merge even tho i love him, i basically had to ccreate this narrative that jakey thinks that me jakey scott and devon are voting kendall but jakey is actually voting out scott jesus christ thi round gave me a migraine i have a case of the lie-abetes
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I- there's nothing else to say hahaha the boys don't even talk game. So when I know something y'all will know something
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People are paranoid as hell about a merge. What is there to be paranoid about, honestly? I've just tried to come into this game and have a good time and I think I've achieved that. No one is really looking at me as a threat right now, and there's still plenty of time left to play.
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okay so i filmed a video confessional earlier which i will upload but adam just woke me up to the fact that we might be merging tonight?! which is so exciting and kinda crazy.... and the days line up with montenegro for us to be merging... at merge i think all my "laying low" can finally be for something and i can transition the bonds i've been making into making stuff happen. i've also been hosting a game during these quarantine times and i've realised people that do too much making SUCH deep bonds during the early stages become the people the jury is mad at in the endgame. i feel like im the middle ground, people feel close to me (and I would like to think I've come across as likable) without everyone thinking im their soul sister closest ally. at merge i think my "close" people who i can somewhat rely on are: autumn, jake, dan(?), jordan(?) and adam? like i have a core of people with various connections, which gives me some cover. its just about then feeling out the rest and seeing who i can trust amongst the rest... particularly the unknowns of augusto/kendall/scott/amir (assuming they are all at merge). like that is going to be the most important part of the merge stage for me, is figuring out which of them i can trust (and i do think dan and/or jake's opinions can help with this, because brainstorming with autumn helped me figuring out this hathor swap tribe).
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i'm excited for merge... i do think i have early juror written all over me but i am also very excited. its time to emerge from the shadows and stumble my way into the light
live fast die young merge boots do it well. i literally am a clown, i got excited by my guess going so well and now i literally am a target the size of the sun exclusively because of my own actions what was i thinking KJASDFA honestly at this point? i embrace it, i push the 'im a shield' narrative and i trot on my little trotters to being mayor of ponderosa. this season i chopped of my own head so will not be the winner and the king, but hopefully i can be a kingmaker? also if me winning the tiebreak sends jake home i literally will be so unspeakably frustrated with myself i will literally... scream. HE PROBS HATES ME. i'm praying he lives i will feel so bad if he doesnt KLASDF
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i literally... can not believe i am so stupid my lack of braincells really boggles my mind
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So I was really hoping that we would win this challenge today because I like everyone on this tribe. But of course with my luck in this game, we lose AGAIN. And it's a shame because I like the Thots Alliance and i feel bad voting out Devon. I know he's someone who trusts me and although I don't 100% trust him, I know that he's someone I can depend on. Plus he makes a really good goat at the end, so it'll make winning more of an obstacle for me without him there. To my surprise however, Kendall and Augusto approach me with the idea of voting out Jakey. I really like Jakey and I practically see him as my #1 here, so voting him out would be difficult for me to do as well. We've discussed the idol together, he gave me his CBS all access account info to watch the finale, and hes one of the very few smart people in this game. So on a personal level, this is a hard decision to make. However, from a game perspective, it might be the right call. Jakey's setting himself up to be a swing vote at the merge, and the fact that he campaigned for Dan to stay and was adamant on not voting him out shows that. When it comes to Devon and I, I would prefer to not vote Devon out but if I needed to in order to show that I trust an alliance moving forward I would. So the fact that Jakey doesn't see it like that is alarming to me. In addition to that, I know that Jakey has lied to me multiple times in this game. He purposefully gave me the wrong idol clue for one of the matches, and when I called him out on it he bluffed it up. On top of that, I know for a fact that he voted for Kendall during the AJ vote. And the fact that he's trying to play it off on Devon goes to show the lengths he would go to make sure he controls everything. And on top of that, he wants us all to tell Devon straight up that he's going. Like... did he not learn from my story when I tried to do that? It can't happen. From a game perspective, voting out Jakey is the more logical choice to make. He can navigate better in a group of people and is aware of whats going on. Devon on the other hand, doesn't even know where the idol is or how to look for it. Devon is someone who you can take into a merge and know what he's going to do. Jakey is more unpredictable. And I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to rally up troops to blindside me when that time came. From a personal perspective, I prefer that Devon goes just because of the lack of trust between us and the fact that I don't ever see myself fully trusting him. Sadly I have to lose this battle in order to win the war at the end. So I'm going to vote Jakey out tonight and really hope that it doesn't come to bite me in the but or that he doesn't play his idol (i know he has one, its obvious with how paranoid he's been)
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Guess I’m gonna cry because we lost… by a tiebreaker… it was sad. I feel especially awful because had I not made the mistake of repeating a name on my list during my 8th guess, we could’ve very well have won… but no one needs to know that! It just blows because going into a potential merge in a 7-5 scenario is NOT it. Plus like, their only vote was a unanimous vote for Connor which like… love Connor, but a rock could vote Connor out. I wanted to see tension, I wanted to see idols played, I wanted to see hands thrown, I wanted to see lines drawn, and I wanted to see messiness but all I ended up seeing? Disappointment. I hate it here deadass (‘:
Aside from being kinda sad we lost, I do feel super secure. Last round, I wanted Dan to leave to get rid of Brawn numbers and have the best chance to get Jakey out and now I have that! I know Amir is on the fence but I know Kendall and Devon would be all for it (Scott is as well, but I didn’t really know how much he’d be about it until this round) so it needs to happen. While I adore Jakey as a person and we’ve connected a lot, our strategic games don’t align at all since he doesn’t tell me much of anything? Most of his info goes to Amir or Scott and I’m being selfish here but I want all the tea (‘: plus him playing double agent with the Brawns at merge is not what I need if we’re going into the merge with not enough numbers. Not only that but Adam is a wildcard in terms of if he’ll work with me or not but Jakey being there with us makes it so Adam wouldn’t want to so there’s that. Girl… i sound like a whole ass gamebot wtf ghfdjnms
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It’s so weird like I am extremely proud of the game I am playing but I still feel inadequate as a player? I know I shouldn’t compare myself to others because I’m ME but my two closest allies (Kendall, Amir) are playing so much better? Amir is able to get all the tea in the world and form those important game connections which I don’t feel like I can yknow? With Kendall, she is just so bold (and beautiful) with her gameplay in a way I could never like she doesn’t mind being the secondary target, she talks to everyone and talks game with everyone, and stuff like that. So in a way, I’m probably not a major threat to people because those two icons are here BUT I also don’t know if that’ll make me seen like a non-factor… that’s just how I feel going into merge and it’s kinda mehhh idk ;-;
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MERGE IS COMING. TOnight actually, people are speculating, but im the only one with the certainty that its tonight and im feeling wonderful. I think if I play my cards right Im gonna have a lot of options come merge. God pending Kendall does not die tonight (hopefully her beauties keep her alive) im gonna suggest we secret pair beware this shit and tsart working from opposite sides to keep each other safe. That will allow me to pick of people Im not working with, while hopefully ensure that people im not with who are with her will be detered from targeting me. Thats my plan but who knows what the true dynamics of merge will be. Ive been playing quiet so far but im about to become the star of teh show, my ego just cant take it.
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i really feel like by getting a five i got jake voted out and i want to scream i literally am gonna be out for blood if he goes
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beshka-yuratcha · 7 years
Text
Birds of a Feather -Chap. 1
When Lance got captured by the galra he was not expecting his team to immediately attack the ship he was on.nor did he expect the smaller ship he managed to get in to have a master control option from with in the ship dictating where he ended up. Pidge luckily managed to hack it from inside the ship giving him time to enter coordinates but the time window was small and the only coordinates he could remember off the top of his head where those of Earth’s so he punched those in and before he knew it he was off.
He could no longer hear his team through the communicators and he had no idea where he was. The ship was still on the auto pilot so trying to slow or figure out where he was was useless. All he knew was he was heading to Earth. He was heading home. He just wished he could tell his team they must be worried about him. 
The long journey gave him time to think. He was hungry but there was no food. He was thirsty but there was only the small bit of water he had on him. He couldn’t help but wonder if the team was looking for him. If he was needed and missed so badly they were non stop searching for him like they had for Shiro. By the time he got to his destination he was starving, dehydrated and going stir crazy as well as depressed and anxious. 
The landing was rough but what happened after was worse. It was finding Shiro all over again but this time they transported him back to the Garrison and locked him up in a room down below the main building. He was held down to a table and poked and prodded at till he screamed. They asked him questions that he refused to answer in detail too afraid as he watched Iverson in the background frowning sternly at him. He didn’t know how long he was strapped down and questioned for before they sedated him. The only good thing was the IV in his arm was hydrating him and they gave him a feeding tube while disgusting helped some. 
He wasn’t sure how long he was out but he was woken many times for more tests to be run and more questions to be asked. “Where are the others?” “With Allura and Coran in the Castle.” “Who is Allura? Who is Coran?What Castle?” “Allura is the Princess, Coran is her advisor, The Castle is The Castle of Lions.” He answered some of the questions not going into detail afraid of what they would do if he tried to talk about aliens like Shiro had. Afraid they would say he was insane. They would lock him up and he would never get free. He didn’t say that his friends where searching for him didnt answer their questions about the blue lion and the cave they found where Blue had been hidden. 
By the 13th sleep and wake pattern cycle they had developed he had almost forgotten He was still inside the Garrison. That is until a boy dropped through the air vent. “Don’t speak.” He whispers softly barely audible over the sounds of the machines. “I don’t kn ow how long that blocker will hold on the video circuit.” He works quickly to remove Lance from his bounds disconnecting him from the tubes and IVs. He turned off the heart monitor before disconnecting it so it wouldn’t go off. “Put these on quick.” He shoved a pair of pants and a shirt at him before bracing all their weight on the table he had been strapped to and shoving it inch by inch under the vent. 
It was a tiny vent and would be a tight squeeze which left Lance wondering how the boy got through it. Then again while this guy was tall he was skinny. Long limbed and rather more delicate features that made him look more feminine. His voice was oddly high too. The bit he spoke it mixed between high and a lower pitch almost like he was trying to speak differently and having a hard time doing so. Lance dressed quickly not wanting to linger. “Quick follow me grab my foot once I’m in and I’ll help pull you up.” The boy jumped grabbing the edge of the vent and slowly working himself up into it bracing arms and knees on the sides before dropping a foot down for Lance to grab. 
Lance didn’t hesitate for once grabbing it and letting himself be pulled up enough for him to work himself into the vent as well. Lance’s foot was just hanging out of the vent when the commotion reached them. “Hurry the loop has ended. We got to get out of here.” The boy whispers moving faster as he climbed up the vent with Lance behind him. The noise reached the room below just as they were reaching where the vent turned sideways actually a air duct rather then a vent. He could hear Iverson shouting and couldn’t help but shudder. A glance down showed that they were directly below the vent opening. The boy scrambled up into the level part of the air duct and turned to pull Lance up just as they fired a shot up at them. Lance yelped as he was pulled out of the way in the nick of time. 
“Follow quickly.” He whispers half dragging Lance after them through maze of vents before they exited into a bathroom. The boy crawled under a stall door that read out of order. A bag was shoved back under the door followed by the guy. “Here put this on.” A Galaxy Garrison uniform was thrust at him. He changed out of the clothes he had put on earlier to put on the uniform instead. A black short wig made of real hair was included along with a wig cap so Lance put it on before fighting to get the contacts in as well. “I had the heat sensors hacked along with the motion sensors so we are safe for now.” 
The boy had pulled on the bottom half of the unifrom while Lance was getting dressed and was working on the top half. Lance gaped at him not because of the hacking Pidge did it all the time so did Matt. No this boy had a binder on. This confused Lance as his brain wanted to refer to him as her but a part of him said that was rude he didn’t know for sure if they were just hiding their gender like Pidge or where trans. He thought he read somewhere that if they were trans they wouldn’t want to show their binder but then again this wasn’t a normal situation so he was making himself more confused. Seeing his face they laughed. “Yes I’m a girl. No I am not trans. Well actually I am but I’ve already transitioned. I’m just hiding being trans to fool the Garrison.Just follow me and I’ll explain more. We have to wait for the commotion to die down before escaping.” 
Lance just nodded deciding to go along with what she was saying his instincts said to trust her so he was. He followed her out of the bathroom once the bag and clothes was burned yes burned. A bottle of perfume and a lighter and woosh. They were sneaking out and back towards the dorms. They made it into a room which he assumed was hers before collapsing. “I had a video feed made of me and my roommate going into the bathroom and had it played so it will look like we went in and came out but where not in there long enough to free you but long enough to get up to something if you catch my drift. Lance grinned. “Smoking, drugs or fucking?” He asked. “Pretty much. Anyways my name is Sora. My roommate owes me a huge favor for helping him sneak a girl in here once and back out  again as well as sneaking out to pay a visit to his family tonight. You have a similar build to him and similar skin tone so with a wig and contacts you can take his place for the next few days till we can get out. This is him paying me back that and helping me break into where they had all your and your friends stuff hidden.” 
Lance gaped. “You got my stuff. Sora I barely know you but I love you.” Sora smiled and laughed. “Can I ask? Why are you helping me?” Lance questions sitting on the bed. Sora sat on the floor across from him. “You know my cousin. Takashi. When He went missing I knew it wasn’t pilot error like they said I had reason to believe it was due to outside interference so to speak. But I couldn’t act not without drawing attention. I was also in the process of transitioning . By the time I finished transitioning you and your friends had disappeared. I snuck in the Garrison made friends with people of certain skills such as my roommate Issac and dug into what really happened. When I found out about you I made plans to free you and have you be my guide to find Takashi.” Sora explained it all handing him a box of his stuff from under the bed. “Wait wait wait.... Takashi as in Shiro? You’re Shiro’s cousin?” 
“Distantly. A couple time removed but yes cousins.” “Okay you’re Shiro’s cousin nice to meet you. Now can you explain how or why you had reason to believe Shiro and the others disappeared due to ‘outside interference’ as you put it.” Lance’s poor brain was just trying to catch up with everything going on. This girl seemed to have everything thought out. “I believed that Shiro disappeared due to aliens. I figured some species of aliens got with in the galaxy and decided to abduct or capture Shiro and the others for their own gain. I know some races are into slavery. Some lone strange aliens from a far off galaxy that holds very little life on the planets within it? And not having to deal with the entire planet to get a few slaves but rather just grab and go? It’s a perfect opportunity for them to make some GAC. I know about aliens and such and yes about GAC and all sorts of other things because I’m part Alien.” Pushing her hair out of the way of her neck and turning she let Lance see the small delicate but very real feathers making their way down her neck and disappearing into her shirt. Small delicate looking in smoky gray shades with bits of black mixed in. Feathers he vaguely remembered seeing in a picture of a almost extinct race of aliens, Aliens that had wings. “Quiznak.”  
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vr2 · 5 years
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*turn around in shorts that say its time for my fuckin opinion on the ass* hey sweaty read to choke on my bns hot takes for uh lets see here uh ... t-two thousand words....
first of all... im pretty easily entertained so if u fail to do that its so like something has gone horribly wrong. i can enjoy pretty much anything halfway decent and i hate nitpicking on shit. but nitpicking implies small problems and sometimes the problem is the whole fucking thing. but man the direction bns has been going in is like. it really be like that, it really be just the most blatantly boring and uninspired it could go and here’s my fucking video essay that i will not do you the honour of being read aloud since the force of my opinion would crush your skull like a grape if spoken in the real world. 
first of all. i generally didnt have a problem with act1 bns story, i honestly thought it had some cool characters, some COOL as fuck cutscenes and as a person that loves lore juice a lot of the characters held a lot of promise and the diary was a fun read despite being the absolutely worst most stupid way to deliver any sort of lore content.
the circular narrative, the tight ending and the callback to all the characters was pretty well-rounded, a little but hammy but adopting the hongmoon kids nad becoming the master of your school was pretty novel. i really felt like there were so many new places to go with this dynamic, like bns could do something new by giving the mc more stakes in other characters rather than being a complete wildcard drifter.
but they keep doing this fucking thing were they repeat story themes in a way thats become incredibly unwelcome. i can understand why npcs would become recurring characters, why certain objects etc are still relevant but the fact that beat for beat the endgame again is divine mandate, mushins there, namsoyoo in danger and someone gets killed off for the sake of idk tragedy i guess. 
i think the worse thing is that the game tries to be tongue in cheek about its tropiness and normally id be like ok cool but the tropes are executed just so fucking blandly and soullessly its kind of insulting like. they really absolutely did not fucking try in the slightest for this one. not at fucking all. 
ryu saying ‘oh it would be so bad if you passed out form poison at an inconvenient time’ and the obvious death flags from bunah and bunyang are incredibly grating when you have absolutely no fucking stake in the story, know exactly whats coming cause the writing repeats itself over and over and know the exact same beats. 
at the very least most people can stand tropey anime, hell you can even ENJOY it if you are absorbed into the world and characters and the tropes are executed well. but this story is wholesale just same fucking shit slightly different npcs. it feels like they tries to manufacture drama in the most blatantly cheap way and it really lets itself down. i could honestly see them killing ONE of the kids for cheap and dirty tearjerking but man all of them leaving you alone again with jsy is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo unebelievably lazy. we have entered asian tv drama levels but at least those are fucking interesting. even the dance number in this act was shit.
i think the most annoying thing is that bns is one of the first mmos i played way back when and i still genuinely like the game up to a point and i like the world and characters. im literally always moaning bout how they did fuck all with the eight masters but gave them the barest most tantalizing hints of interesting characterisation in the diaries. but i think that’s all you need. it doesnt need to be 24/7 ballz to the walls worldending tragedy shock tactics to be entertaining. it somehow feels like they played it so incredibly safe that they looped around and made the worst decision possible and i just really wish theyd hire just your random ass average fucking ln writer cause theyd at least make shit entertaining. like the long form story telling of a truple a game thats reaching nearly 10 acts now should definitely be better than this like. what a fucking way to drop the ball.  
now. my second bone to grind. tell me why they actively REMOVED? ALL SIDE QUESTS? what kind of game, especially an mmo would fucking remove its OWN lore? why would that make any fucking sense? especially for how lore-light this game is but how vast its world is like sidequests felt like the absolute BARE minimum way to furnish this admittedly underdeveloped world. they at least gave us that slight illusion of depth and some of them were even fun! interesting! i still remember the sidequest where you go on a ‘hostage rescue mission’ to save an npc’s son who was kidnapped by lycandi and the npc who fucking gave you the mission murders his own son in front of you cause he was bumpin with the lycandi like. it’s not fucking riveting writing but it gave some more context to the places you visit, it’s SOMETHING about the supposed people that inhabit the world and it clearly makes some places more memorable than just ‘cool sky desert’, ‘cool sky city’, ‘cool sky village’.
im vaguely aware that this was done cause it ‘confused players’ who thought they had to do blue quests to level up to endgame and firstable idk why bns pushes endgame as the only ‘good’ part when its like in my humble opinion really fucking boring. you know people play mmos for different reasons? not just to reach lvl 100 super tier omega hongmoon thornbuster breakre 5000 and be no.1 in pvp. just looking flashy and good combat isn’t really enough to compete these days. im guessing its a push to the esports scene but also like you really want to serve one side better by doing relateively arbitrary thing that fucks over pve ppl? like? 
also there ARE genuinely people interested in the world and content and story as exemplified by all the oc and various comics and even even some official webcomics like i honestly dont think nc at all in any way nurtures that side of their mmo nearly enough especially when you see how healthy and thriving ff14 and other communities are in their oc scene. the sheer fact that people still stuck around despite the experiene of playing bns being patently awfully optimised and an uphill battle in every single way is testament to the fact that maybe some people just genuinely like the game? gutting it is absolutely antithesis to that.
i actually cant wrap my head around purposefully deleting lore cause it makes ‘grinding to endgame’ too confusing like does the story take that low a priority? the fucking ACTUAL game and the story is less important than people mindlessly burning themselves out to endgame, grinding dungeons and buying lootboxes like you cant do in literally every other game anyways? why would you get rid of some of the only shit that makes your game even slightly different? like im not out here saying it was the most revolutionary great shit but at least the side quests TRIED to give a modicum of flavour to bns. like they at least attempted to add to all the zones and make them places rather than set pieces were story happens to you then you leave and never come back. it doesnt even have to be revolutionary amazing writing to do that it just needs to be serviceable to give even the slightest sense of depth.
but for some reason rather than idk. just tell people theyre just flavour text and theyre not compulsory or just toggle on/off the fucking blue quest markers you decide to fucking? nuke the already translated (which someone no doubt paid for), completely unintrusive, absolutely functional, if somewhat tedious sidequests? making the whole fucking game even MORE barren and lifeless? FOR FREE? what a fucking deal.
 i literally cannot understand this clownery this absolute idiot idea could only have been concocted by the specific brand of stupidity found only in corporate sales dept. but like i think its also emblematic of how this game has no creative direction other than make Money which is fucked cause theres genuinely many parts of this game that i enjoy from like characters, music, visuals theres A LOT of promise in bns even if it takes a lot of legwork to get to it. as much as people give htk shit he absolutely made this game what it is visually and thematically, the soundtrack fucking rocks, theres some solid characters and story elements, a lot of the game still holds up visually and som of it dare i say looks fucking good. give bns a try its free to play.
maybe ive just been spoiled by fgo and gbf and literally every other popular game ACTUALLY trying to write good shit. trying to give their readers lore, trying to make things genuinely ENJOYABLE as a game should be rather than a part time job. but man i always forget after act1 bns really reveals why its never broken out from being a midweight grindy mmo 
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